Scotland

Since I haven't had any pictures this month, this post shall have them in abundance.

Something I forgot to mention: we saw Avatar in 3D last Monday. It was an impressive thing, but I think that 3D cinematography needs to find it's sea legs before the medium really takes off. Certain 2D conventions, like changing the focus of a frame to direct the viewer's eye, don't really work in 3D (or, at least, I haven't adapted it yet).

So Wednesday morning, we left for Edinburgh. Our flight left at 6:30 in the morning and I was up at half three. We fortunately made it onto the correct plane and were in Edinburgh within two hours. Our hotel wasn't expecting us until noon, so we grabbed breakfast and walked around the neighborhood. Not a touristy location, but lots of cool shops. We checked in, napped, then headed into city center. Edinburgh's city center is a castle on a huge hill, something I feel we lack in America. Enjoy pictures:



The castle's hill was surrounded by a rather nice park. Statues and flowers and stuff.



One of the things I noticed about Edinburgh was how green the city is. Everybody has a little garden out front (all very well-maintained) and some of these seem like tiny parks. People stuff their interiors (by the windows) with flowers and bushes and trees. Streets were tree-lined, sometimes twice.

Things were mostly closed by the time we go out to the city center. The next day, we meant to go on a Highland Tour, a bus tour to see some of the countryside and the highlands. We tried walking to city center, but made a wrong turn (or, rather, planned a long route) and missed the bus - our early wake-up was in vain. Unyielding to despair, we walked to the National Museum. There were many fine works there, from Raphael, Titian, Da Vinci, and Boticelli.



And Harviestoun. Here's me enjoying a particularly excellent example of craftsmanship. From the museum, it was a short walk to the Walter Scott monument.


This spire's exterior was covered with character's from his stories. Fun. Even more so were the views offered from the top.



Old Town. Old. Medieval old. Edinburgh is filled with old buildings. Like this one, part of Old Town:


Point of interest: Old Town is entirely uphill, no matter which direction you travel in.


Princes Street, the main thoroughfare for the city now (the castle and Old Town would be to the left of here). Also, New Town. Not quite as old as Old Town, but still (mostly) a couple of centuries old.




More castle pictures! Woo!



Clayton Hill. Deceptively hard to walk towards, even if you follow the street leading straight towards it.


When we made it to the top, the views offered were choice. Here's Emer looking pensive as she gazes upon the city. From here, we booked it into Edinburgh castle.

The palace, where the crown jewels were kept.

The castle was (as you may have guessed in the previous pictures) quite large. The crown jewels of Scotland were stored there and I learned much about the history of Scotland. There was quite an interesting exhibit about when the castle was used as a POW camp during the War of American Independence. We stayed there, enjoying the castle until the place closed and we were kicked out. We were about to leave, but we noticed a crowd forming and decided to wait to see what the fuss was about. As it turns out, a new governor of Edinburgh Castle was being installed. Much pomp and circumstance.


There was a kilted marching band. Yes, that is a bagpipes and brass band.


The new governor, leading his escort. There was a regent of the Queen there. In part of the ceremony, he walked up to the castle walls and knocked on the gates. I kid you not, a guard appeared at the top of the walls and shouted "Who goes there?" This happened after a half hour of bagpipes playing right outside. Someone didn't get the memo about a new boss.

The next day, we woke up early again and made our way into city center. Emer insisted upon taking the bus this time though (it's only 1.8 miles to walk). We managed to catch our Highland bus tour and left for Loch Lomond. I have no pictures of this for two reasons. Firstly, midges were as thick as fog near the lake. Secondly, the batteries ran out. When we stopped for lunch and a hike at Loch Katrina, we picked up some new batteries and let the camera go wild.




As you can see, the lake was beautiful and the weather followed suit. The highlands were particularly awe inspiring. Our final destination was Stirling and Stirling Castle.


Stirling has a sweet cemetery.


Stirling, a tower whose name is unknown to me, and the Highlands.


Stirling palace. The castle has held a distinguished place in Scottish history, as the single road into the Highlands went through Stirling. Both William Wallace and Robert the Bruce fought important battles within a few miles of the castle. Despite it's significance, I felt Edinburgh has the better castle.


Stirling does have tapestries and an active tapestry workshop. This tapestry is part of a seven piece series "The Hunt of the Unicorn".



Another highlight of the third day was finally taking a picture of ourselves that looks alright. I've gone through a few dozen photos that only show half of my head, or only a single one of Emer's eyes are visible. It sounds like a simple task in theory, but you know what they say about theory and practice.

The next morning, we left for our (thankfully not so early) flight and enjoyed being back home. Yes, I had haggis. Every morning for breakfast. Delicious.

Tomorrow we'll be going into Dublin again, then I will be heading back to Dayton on Tuesday morning. This month has really flown by, but I can't complain. The month with Emer has been absolutely fantastic.

The Streets of Dublin

I've got one week left in Ireland before returning home. This month certainly has flown by (as months tend to do).
Over this past weekend, Dublin hosted the World Street Performer Contest, bringing street performers from all over to perform. I was expecting a sort of chaotic, bazaar-like scene with fire-eaters and sword-swallowers crowding every corner. Instead, it was a much more organized and relaxed affair. The contest took place in Merrion Square, a small park a little ways from St. Stephen's green. There were two 'stages' (open areas of grass) for the performers to show off their stuff. The quality of the performances ranged from highly entertaining to painful and predictable. Canada, in particular, had a mediocre showing. And I did get to see fire consumed that evening.
We rounded off Saturday evening with Butler's hot chocolate (because it's never too warm for hot chocolate) and had dinner at Bewley's, an extremely old restaurant. Apparently, the Bewleyes are almost as old and respected a family in Dublin as the Guinesses. The food was good, the restaurant was all decked out with statues and old paintings, and craic was had.
Fair weather continued throughout the weekend and the days have been filled with small pleasures. We went back to Blessington for a Sunday dinner, where I met Emer's sister and youngest brother. We brought back a trunk full of desserts. Monday afternoon was particularly sunny, so we spent the afternoon outside reading books in a field. Today, we went back into Dublin (Emer had an interview with a child counseling service) and took a bit of a walk about the place.
I really feel like I'm getting to know Dublin and how to get around. A natural enough consequence of spending so much time there, I suppose.

Tomorrow morning (waking up at 4:00), we're leaving to catch a 6:30 flight from Dublin to Edinburgh. We'll be spending three nights looking for adventure and attempting to understand the accent.

Viking Hats

Last Friday, I came to the shocking realization that I have been in Ireland for almost two weeks and hadn't yet worn a viking hat. Seeking ot remedy this situation, Emer and I booked a trip with Viking Splash Tours. They give you a tour of Dublin on an old DUKW ("duck"), an amphibious bus from WWII. You get to wear a viking hat and shout a viking roar to the "unsuspecting Celts" on the streets below. The bus goes down both the streets of Dublin and the Grand Canal (what's a viking voyage without getting your feet wet?) The tour guide was one of the best I've ever had. He really was in the spirit of the thing and told terrible, terrible jokes. I liked him for both.
Apart from the splash tour, its been a fairly quiet week. The weather continues to be much nicer than I expected, but a few rainy days forced us to doss inside all day (not that I have anything against dossing.) We made falafel again and have had a few other dinners with the flatmates. We've been watching a movie more or less every night with them as well. Last night was Resident Evil, a deliciously bad movie. It seemed like half the movie was done in CGI that's over a decade old, which made it even better. Not that I'm mocking the graphics - not after the computer graphics class I took last semester.
Sorry for taking so long between these last updates, I'll keep up the blog more faithfully in the week and a half I've got left. There'll also be more pictures. Promise.

The weather's gone bad...

It's been a pretty exciting week for me across the pond. The unnaturally good weather we had the first day continued until a few days ago. I actually was able to work on my tan here in Ireland - who'd have thought? We've spent the days outside as much as possible, walking along the canal or going to the Dublin Zoo.
The Dublin Zoo, in particular, was very nice (it was warm enough to wear shorts that day, honestly.) We got to see the penguins get fed, baby giraffes, and a pair of hippos charge a duck that dared to swim in their pond. (The duck escaped safely.) After the zoo trip, we walked into town and had a delicious dinner (suki yaki) at some Asian restaurant.
However, the weather's taken a turn for the worse. Or rather, a turn towards normality. It is once again cloudy and rainy and everything I've come to expect from Ireland. Most of yesterday was spent making falafel, which turned out much better than expected. It tasted delicious, but the texture wasn't quite what good falafel ought to be.
Today was spent meeting Emer's parents (dad and step-mother) up in Blessington. They were very nice people, feeding me and serving lots of tea. I think I had six or seven cups this afternoon. We took a walk along beautiful Lake Blessington and I enjoyed the views offered by the country roads. Blessington is right next to the Dublin Mountains, so the landscapes and scenery offered was choice. After our lakeside walk, we stopped back to her folks for dinner (and more tea). I got along famously with her family, or at least the part I've met so far.
Another day, another delicious meal. I've been eating too much here :)

Back in Ireland

Hello again, faithful readers. As evidenced by this new post, I am currently back in Ireland. While I was staying here last semester, I met Emer, the most amazing and beuatiful girl in Ireland. We saw each other for two of the three months I was in Ireland and decided to try a long-distance relationship shortly after I returned. After five months, it is decidedly less long-distance.
I arrived in Dublin airport yesterday after quite a journey. I spent the long weekend in New York City, visiting and being touristy with my dad and Vicki. Although the city was much larger than I expeccted, we managed to pack quite a bit into the two and a half days I stayed. We saw the Statue of Liberty and floated by Ellis Island, but apart from that we stayed within Manhattan. We saw Wall Street, the Emipre State building, walked to the top of the Rockefeller Center, and took a couple of bus tours around - one around downtown and one around uptown. I was only able to see Central Park from the outside, which was a bit of a shame, but it's a good reason to go back to NYC :)
After all of the walking and sightseeing, we made it through the harrowing New Jersey Turnpike and to LaGuardia airport. My flights had to be rerouted because of the stormy weather coming through the Great Lakes, but my final destination time was (thankfully) unchanged. After landing, I managed to stumble through Customs and I found Emer. My luggage apparently took a detour, though. We took a cab home and I promptly collapsed and fell asleep.
Today was unnaturally warm and sunny (at least for Ireland), so we've spent most of the day outside so far. We've walked around campus, revisiting all the old buildings I used to take classes in. After spending an hour or two basking in the sun in the Garden of Life and Death (seriously), we spent a bit of time walking around town as well then stopped for ice cream in the shopping mall right by the canal. A very good start to what is hopefully a very good month.

Finally Finished, Farewell

The week before was a nice week. I went to Dublin twice this past weekend. On Friday, Arlette and I were invited to a reception / lunch by the Lord Mayor of Dublin. She was doing this for international students. Never one to pass up free food (especially free good food), we both attended. We met a lot of other internationals. An American here or there, a few Russians, and your standard assorted Continentals (French, Spanish, Italian, and German). Several ambassadors also attended, so I chatted up the Indian ambassador. On Sunday, Arlette, Ita, and I went back to Dublin to see some more sights and such. We saw the Kilmainham jail and walked by the Guinness factory on the way to St. Stephen's Green. We were to meet Dan Shannahan there for lunch at Wagamama (awesome name, I know). We would've walked around Guinness factory were we not already late for lunch. Or on time, I suppose, if you're Irish. Lunch was delicious and we wondered around the decked-out mall nearby. Once we got back home, I made the last flat dinner - the famous American Breakfast for Dinner. Again, delicious.

I've finally finished my semester. This past week has been quite busy. I've had SQL assignments, two 3500 word essays, and two exams. It feels nice to be done with it all. Of course, that means my time in Ireland is coming to an end. I've got some mixed feelings about that. I am really looking forward to coming back to the States, seeing family, watching sports like a proper American, etc. Yet I feel like I've been on an adventure for the past three months (which seems like much longer than three months. I feel like I've been here for ages.) and I don't quite want that adventure to end. I've landed in a foreign country and knew a single person (brother of a friend). I've been all over the country (north, south, east, and west) and was able to spend nine days in Paris. I've met some amazing people here and made some great friends. I've learned a lot about Ireland, America, and myself. (I also learned a little of that college education stuff). I feel culturally educated now. Good job me.

There are many things I'll miss about Ireland. Guinness is probably in the top three. Or two. The people I've met are up there as well. I'm gonna miss the friendliness that everyone seems to have - where you could wander into a pub, sit down next to someone, and have a new best mate. I might miss the Irish accent, even though I haven't given it a second thought for the past few months. I might even miss Euros and how coins are actually worth something.

I've taken some more pictures of Maynooth town and its pubs. Oh pubs. You will be missed as well.

The road leading up to North Campus. The shopping mall is the big building in the back.

O'Neills. Jazz nights on Tuesdays and Rock and Roll on Mondays - the music was always good. As the second smallest pub, it had quite a cozy feel.

The Mantra. The upstairs is the closest thing Maynooth has to a nightclub and the only place in town to charge cover. The downstairs was more traditional and had a pub quiz every Tuesday. This place just opened up last year. It used to be the dive bar but is much snazzier now.

This is the Roost. Yes, everything in this picture, except for the chimney way on the right-hand side. There are four different bars and two separate dance floors inside. The Roost had live music Sunday through Thursday nights. My personal favorite pub.

Church. I went here on Sundays. It was conveniently located on the way to the pubs.

There are two other pubs - the Student's Union pub and the Clocktower. I never went to the Clocktower because it's just a little too far away. The SU pub is notable for the three euro pints they had every Monday. As a student, I often felt compelled to take advantage of this offer.

This will be the last post in my blog. I've enjoyed writing about my experiences and adventures and I hope you've enjoyed reading. I'd like to thank everyone who read this blog, especially those of you that commented and made me feel loved. Extra kudos to you.

I'd like to say something profound in Irish here, but my vocabulary is pretty limited. I think 'goodbye' is 'slawn' or something like that, which I suppose will do.
S'long and slán.

Internet was down yesterday

But I was bored, so I wrote a blog post. Here ya go.

I have less than two weeks left in Ireland. For some reason, two weeks seems like a huge milestone. Fifteen days is a lengthy span of time, but thirteen days is hardly any time at all. Two weeks today I'll be heading up to Chicago (which I'm really looking forward to).
I've got quite a bit of work to do in the meantime. A computer program or two, some math worksheets, and two essays with six thousand words between them. Obviously, the essays are the greater part of the work to do. Apart from that, I have one single exam to take the last week.

I'll leave the better part of my ruminations on leaving Ireland for next week. This week, I'll speak of America - land of the free and such. Here's the top five things I miss most about the good ol' US of A.
1) Chipotle. You have no idea how much I crave this. I think I could eat it three times a day for a month.
2) Peanut Butter. Ireland has peanut butter in the same way America has Guinness - a pale imitation of what it should be. A proper PB & J is next on my "To Eat" list.
3) Snow. It's not cold enough in Ireland to get snow. Chirstmastime doesn't feel the same without snow at some point.
4) Friends and family and what not.
5) Cheap alcohol. A tray of Budweiser (18 500ml cans) costs 28 Euros (roughly 42 real dollars), whereas a case back home (24 330 ml cans) is less than 17 dollars.. A pint in a pub is six real dollars if you're lucky.

Don't feel bad, friends and family. You managed to beat out cheap booze.

I've received some housing information for Dayton next semester. I'll be staying with international students in Gardens Apartments on Stewart. I really liked the little cultural exchanges that occurred between my flatmates and I this semester and I'll try to continue that.

Happy St. Nicholas Day to all. Despite the lack of snow, I am full-out in the holiday spirit and very much looking forward to Christmas. I was promised a pumpkin pie to myself since I wasn't able to have any for Thanksgiving.

Before we depart for the semester, I promised Arlette a list of things she should do when she and her husband visit America. I've compiled a list, but I want to know if you guys can think of anything they need to do, eat, visit, or try in order to truly experience America. The less region-specific, the better.
- Visit Cedar Point (a little region-specific, but they are huge roller coaster fans).
- Eat at Chipotle.
- Eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Use Reduced Fat JIF brand peanut butter.
- Eat BBQ chicken wings, funnel cake, chocolate peanut butter pie, pumpkin pie, crab cakes, and an alfredo pasta dish.
- Dunk Oreos in milk.
- Root against the New York Yankees.
- Eat Twinkies, possibly deep-fried.
- Don't go to New Jersey.
- Go to a baseball, football, or basketball game. Attend the tailgate, if it's a football game.
- Good beers: Arrogant Bastard Ale, Honker's Island, Mad Anthony's, Yuengling
- Go camping. Eat S'mores.
- Go to a drive-in movie theater.

Turkey Day and Belfast Weekend

Well, the previous weekend's plans mostly fell apart. I didn't go to Dublin or play basketball. I also missed the kenpo class. These all turned out to be blessings in disguise, since I had quite a bit of homework to do over the weekend.

Thanksgiving dinner was absolutely wonderful. I cooked a turkey (7 pounds), gravy, rolls, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and corn (and we had some apple crumble tart for dessert). I was serving eight that night: myself, Thomas, Arlette, and Hawkins, as well as Thomas's friend Thomas and his girlfriend Nicoli, Ita (a friend of the flat), and Cecilia (another friend of Thomas). Fortunately, Other Thomas used to work as a chef - he was a great help in the kitchen and made sure I didn't make too many mistakes. I also learned several awesome tricks from him, such as the proper way to chop onions without losing fingers.
We didn't eat dinner until around 7:30. This delay (the original plan was to eat at 6:30) was mostly due to our oven, which is conveniently devoid of any temperature markings - you basically guess and hope for the best. In the end, only the top half of the rolls were burnt - everything else came out nicely. The food comas lasted hours and I'm just today finishing up the leftovers.

Friday afternoon, Arlette and I joined the International Club on the Belfast trip. Belfast was a fantastic city. They had just put out all the Christmas lights as well. Since it was after Thanksgiving, I was in full-throttle Christmas spirit. These mixed together well.

Victoria Square is one of the shopping malls around the city center. Although it had more lights, the other main mall, Castle Court, had a much more Christmas-y vibe. Castle Court had a store called The Christmas Store (selling decorations, trees, candles, etc.) and another that had all those amazing old-fashioned toys (no batteries anywhere). In the center of the city, City Hall was all decked out for the holidays.


City Hall, with and without daylight. A traditional European Christmas market was being held here. We had dinner there Friday and Saturday nights (Polish sausage and churros, then raclette and fudge. Mulled wine to drink both nights.) After dinner, we went around to different pubs. Saturday night, Arlette and I went to the Crown Pub, the oldest pub still standing in Belfast. Great craic.

Saturday morning / afternoon, I went on a walk around the city. I had lots of fun stumbling across monuments and such. I wandered into a farmer's market, watched dogs playing in Ormeau Park, watched students playing at Queen's University, and walked through Ulster Museum.

I took some nice pictures as well.

This one was taken at 2:30 in the afternoon. We don't get much sun up here these days.

The old customs house. I saw this Sunday when I took a tour of the harbor area. I saw where the Titanic was launched from ("Built by Irishmen. Sunk by an Englishman.") and the more modern drydocks. Belfast is a real blue-collar town, so I felt some kinship with them. (Not that I'm blue-collar by any stretch. It just reminded me of Cleveland.) Afterwards, I toured the shopping districts and got into the holiday spirit. We had dinner in a small diner off of the main roads.

All said and done, it was an excellent and exciting trip. I think Belfast might be one of my favorite cities now. Although there has been violence (Belfast was the heart of the Troubles) and there still is tension, the city feels alive. The juxtaposition of centuries-old and new architecture makes Belfast quite the interesting place.

One month to go

I'll be leaving Ireland exactly one month today. There's a feeling of inevitability to that.

#18 / 21 Dayton beat #19 / 19 Georgia Tech. GT is in the ACC and plays Duke and UNC two times apiece this season, so this win will pay good dividends for the RPI and SOS.

Last Sunday I found out that the self-defense club trains on the weekends. We did some Jujitsu / Judo and a bit of Eskrima. My back was sore for a few days, since I haven't quite figured out how to properly break my falls yet. On the bright side, Saturdays are Kenpo days and I should be a little more proficient at that.

I've been much more busy with school. I feel like I'm in college again. I even had a microeconomics exam on Wednesday. Although I've been to two classes all semester, I still feel I scored around 75%. Good for a B over here.
On the bright side, I found out that, out of Sociology, Psychology, and Economics, only two of three classes will count to graduation.

This weekend, I'm also playing basketball with the Chinese students and might possibly be going to Dublin. If so, there will be more pictures. There's also some computer work to do.

My computer class has definately been my favorite. It's kind of a survey style class, so we cover a new topic every three weeks. Information Theory was okay, but the next subject was quite interesting. Multiple View Geometry involves feature recognition and some cool stuff called epipolar geometry. At the end of it, we were able to use two pictures taken from slightly different angles and reconstruct a three-dimensional scene from them. Cool beans.

I'm off to do more homework-type stuff.

Basketball, volleyball, the rest of Paris

The Dayton Flyers won their season opener over Chreighton this afternoon, 90 - 80. It was quite strange not being in the stands for the game (I did get a little homesick...) I wasn't able to find a video feed online, but I did catch Larry and Bucky's dulcet tones on their online radio broadcast. Here are some random thoughts on our team.
Dayton has been ranked in the preseason for the first time in decades, so we get professionally-produced videos such as this to get us pumped up.
A lot of the preseason hype focuses on how little we lost from last year. After making it to the second round of the NCAA tourney, we only lost one senior (Charles Little) to graduation. Still, some of the statistics the powers-that-be choose to highlight are a little ridiculous. Example: "The Flyers return 10 of their 11 top scorers from last year." Among these "top scorers" are those such as Paul Williams, adding a vital 2.2 points per game last season. (Caveat - I fully expect Williams to be much more productive this season. He's already had 9 points in the season opener. Still, it just kinda shows how meaningless that 10 / 11 stat is.)
Chris Wright played a great game, scoring 25. Right behind him, the sophmore Chris Johnson seems to have broken out, scoring 18 and grabbing 15 boards.
I saw the highlights video afterwards, including London Warren's insane assist leading to a Marcus Johnson slam (15 seconds in). I watched that part again at least twenty times. If we can keep up that kind of game, we should be pretty good this year :)
This team almost didn't seem like Dayton. Last year, our identity was a defensive and athletic team. We out-jumped and out-rebounded the other teams and completely harassed them on defense (especially the point guard combo of London Warren and Rob Lowry, who are more or less clones of each other defensively, and on amphetamines). But for gravity, our shooters couldn't have hit the floor last year, but our defense really made up for it. Last season, we only scored above 80 four times and gave up more than 70 five times. (And I think only four or five teams were better than 40% shooting last year. Chreighton shot 48.3%)
Dayton shot 72.2% from the charity stripe today. Quite refreshing after for years in the 50, 60% territory.

So far, it's been a good week for sports (go Cavs!) Friday evening, the volleyball club went to Dublin to play IT Tallaght. We won the match in three close sets (scores of 25-21, 23-25, and 25-22). I was used as a libero during the match and had a very good time. I had a few particularly nice diving saves.

I actually have homework to do this weekend, which is a huge change from what I've become accustomed to.

I'll try to finish up Paris tonight :)
Thursday, I spent the day travelling around with Micheal, the English couchsurfer. In the morning, he showed me around Ile-de-France, the business district of Paris. With all of the skyscrapers, it felt much more like home. We walked around the northern / middle section of Paris and took a look at the Centre Pompidou and the Bastille. We both were hit with a strong craving for chocolate milk, so we set out on a quest to find some (we had to look through three different stores.) We drank it sitting on the steps of the Hotel De Ville and discussed EU politics. It was classy.
Afterwards, we left to see Luxemborg. The building itself was not extraordinary, but the gardens surrounding it were. The trees were brilliantly colored and crunchy leaves covered the pathways. My only complaint was that some of the trees were trimmed into square shapes, which I found unnatural and immoral. We then walked around the Latin quarter and checked out the Pantheon (or, "The Least Impressive Monument in Paris).
Micheal and I went our seperate ways afterwards and I met up with Julien again. We went back to his apartment and ordered Dominos pizza (it's much better in France - something about the cheese). We spent the rest of the evening chilling, playing video games, and watching the the Royal Tenenbaums.
Friday was Louvre day. Since this was one of two days with bad weather, it turned out to be a pretty good decision. Unfortunately, the metro from the business district was undergoing repairs, so I had to walk an hour into Paris. The Louvre was fantastic. Works of art where everywhere, although my favorite part of the museum was the museum itself. The wall decorations, facades, ceilings, and architecture were at least as beautiful as most of the pieces contained therein. I did get to see most of the famous pieces, such as the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo, but I was a little unimpressed with them. Too much hype, I suppose. On the other hand, the section of Egyptian artefacts and the preserved living quarters of Napolean III were fascinating (Napolean's rooms defined opulence.)
Wondering around a museum for five hours tends to make one thirsty, so I met up with Julien at a pub (surprise!) He was meeting up with some friends for a birthday celebration. I also met Aviv, an Isreali who would be staying with us Saturday night. Good craic.
On Saturday, I treated Julien to lunch. I figured that I haven't really been to a French restaurant that week and I probably ought to while I was in Paris. Julien took me to a place that did traditional Southwestern French cuisine. I had a very nice duck dish (perhaps scallop de canard avernogne, or something like that) with ham, cheese, and potatoes. Julien had foie gras, so I tried a bite of that.
After lunch, we explored the graveyard Pere Lachaise Cemetary in honor of Halloween. It was a very beautiful graveyard that's been around since the seventeenth century.

Oscar Wilde was amoung those buried here. His grave is covered with lipstick from admirers. Between the feeling of the crisp autumn wind on my face and the cemetary's silence, I found a feeling of perfect contentment.
We met up with Aviv in the evening before heading off to a Couchsurfer party at the train station in Montparnasse. At this point in the week, my French had become almost proficient. I could make out almost half of what people were talking about, then guess the rest. But after anyone's been drinking, this ability fades rapidly. Thankfully, people were mostly happy to speak English (especially the people I met from Canada and California). After that party died down, we went to another party at Julien's neighbor's apartment. It was a much more relaxed affair (perhaps because it was already one-thirty in the morning), but very enjoyable.
Sunday was my last day in Paris. I hadn't been inside Notre Dame during daylight hours, so I paid a little visit. Enjoy some shots of the exterior.



Immediately after this last photo, it began to rain. Since I had to wait five hours for my bus, I was quite fortunate to find the coolest shop in Paris - Shakespeare and Company. This is an amazing bookstore. Bookshelves or ceiling-high stacks of books surround you. All of the titles are in English. The owners take the position that books are meant to be read and provide you with several comfy chairs and couches to do so.

I spent the afternoon going over a book of e e cumming's poetry and a collection of food essays from the New Yorker. (I must apologize for the substandard quality of these photos. My camera was on the fritz since Tuesday and I wasn't able to take enough pictures to get quality shots.)

They amazingly have a piano in the upstairs reading room and they encourage people to simply come up and play whatever. I was treated to several impromptu jazz concerts while reading, which was the perfect capstone to my week in Paris.
The flight back was okay, once I boarded. Before that, it was a nightmare. I waited in line for security for half an hour, at which point I was told to go to the back and wait again (another flight needed to get through before me). I managed to get onto the plane five minutes before it took off.
But even when I landed down in Dublin, my vacation was not over. I didn't get to the train station in Dublin until eleven in the evening. Since it was a Sunday, there was no late train to Maynooth. I had to spend one last night in a nearby hostel before I made it back. On the bright side, this hostel offered soda bread as part of its free breakfast. Also, everyone spoke English, something I won't quite take for granted so much anymore.

Thanksgiving dinner recipes

I'll be cooking a big Thanksgiving dinner for my flat and some friends. I've never basted a turkey in my life before, so if someone could post instructions on that I would be grateful.
Also for from-scratch pancakes.
And pumpkin pie.

Paris, mardi et mercredi

Waking up Tuesday morning, I bade my fellow couchsurfers a fond adieu and left to do some more touristing. After taking the train back, I saw the Eiffel Tower and the Champs de Mars, the park sprawled out in front of said tower. Here's your obligatory picture:

It was much taller than I expected it to be. I didn't pay the nine euros to get a good view - I'd rather have breakfast instead. Pan au chocolat, of course.
I walked by Les Invalides and was searching for the Seine. Unfortunately, I had confused the locations of Les Invalides with the Eiffel Tower, so finding the Seine was quite a bit more of an adventure than it should have been. It was all worth it, though. The Seine might be my favorite part of Paris.

It was an excellent time of year to be in Paris. Almost every tree had started changing colors.

I walked to Ile de la Cite. I had to meet up with Vio, another couchsurfer, in an hour. Until then, I chilled out on the park on the very tip of the island and did some quality peoplewatching.

Vio was not my next host, but a "coffee or drinker." As a couchsurfer, you don't necessarily have to let someone sleep over to host them. Another option the website gives is to simply meet up with surfers for a "coffee or drink" and show them around your town a little bit.

We meet at the huge glass pyramid in the Louvre. From there, we decided to go to Montmarte. Since it was a nice day, we rented a couple bicycles. (In Paris, there are random, automated bicycle rental stations. Using a credit card, you can rent a bike for a euro per hour. These stations are located all over the city, so it really is a convenient way to get around.) Riding a bike through Paris was an exceptional experience - I'd recommend it to any visitors.
Anyone who has been in Paris can tell you that Montmarte is on top of a really high hill. When we finally reached the bike station, there were no other bikes present (each station has space for fifteen bikes).
On top of Montmarte is the Bascillica de la Sacre Coeur, the big white church. Really beautiful inside. Unfortunately, my camera was out of batteries and I'd only be able to take pictures sporadically from this point on. There was a beautiful view of Paris right outside Sacre Coeur (and it was free!) We had some crepes for a snack, stopped by the Moulin Rouge, then found an Australian pub. After a few drinks, we parted ways. I was staying in another hostel that night, so I showed up, stumbled through some French phrases, and drifted off to sleep.

The next morning, the free breakfast offerred was especially classy. Instead of cornflakes, they had a crazy frakencereal - half oatmeal, half Fruit n Fiber. They also gave away milk. Since I was far more aware of Parisien prices, I had three bowls for breakfast (plus the bread). Sated, I was off to go see Les Invalides, the military museum.

Les Invalides was one of my favorite parts of Paris. They had extensive exhibits on WWI and WWII, military artefacts from the thirteenth century onward (like the arms and armor room in Cleveland's Art Museum, but an couple orders of magnitude larger), Napolean's Tomb, and the Cathedral Saint-Louis

Behind this main part of the cathedral, there was a special room for royalty. This way, they could attend the same mass as the common soldier. The sentiment was overwhelming.

After spending the day in Invalides, I met up with Julien, my host for the remainder of the week. He found a cheap bar and we had a few pints before meeting up with Micheal, an English surfer for the first night I was there. We found more beer and falafel crepes. A good night by any standard.

Paris, dimanche et lundi

It's been almost a week since I've had Guinness. That makes me a sad panda. The weather was really nice today. A good thing, except that it made me want to go for a run.
I'm getting a little cabin fever :)

Back to Paris.

I woke up Sunday morning and enjoyed my free breakfast - cornflakes (no milk), bread, and orange juice. Yum. Since I wasn't meeting my first host until five o'clock that day, I signed up for a free walking tour starting outside the hostel. First thing we did on the walking tour was take the metro to St. Micheal's fountain. Apparently, the real tour would start here.

The tour was given in English, so it was pretty easy to meet people. I grabbed a sandwich with some Brazilians and another American. It was a sub sandwich, but with chevre (goat cheese) and chorizo. Quite good. After that, the tour started.


We walked from St. Micheal's Plaza across the Seine to the Ile de la Cite. We didn't see Notre Dame, but we did get a history lesosn on Paris. We crossed Pont Neuf to the other side of the Seine.

You might be able to make out the faces on the bridge above. Apparently, King Henry IV had a party on the bridge after it was completed. A sketch artist had drawn pictures of this. The king liked the pictures enough to commision sculptures of his friends to be placed on the bridge. It's kinda like a facebook for seventeenth-century royalty.

We walked along the Seine some more. It's one of my favorite parts of Paris - it's banks are lined with artists selling their pictures. Touristy? Very. Fun? You bet. After stopping for lunch, we walked around the outside of the Louvre.

The Louvre is absolutely huge - this is just a picture of the one of the walls of the square inner courtyard.

I might not have mentioned this yet, but it was absolutely beautiful weather in Paris almost the whole week. Living in Ireland for the past month, I had pretty much forgotten what sunshine feels like. That week should get me through until I get back :)

After the Louvre, we walked through Jardin de Tuilleries, a beautiful park. There wasn't much grass in the park, which was a tad strange. As were the statues.

It was an odd juxtaposition of classical sculpture right next to these weird alien heads. I liked it.

There was an awesome fountain / pond in the middle. Cymbols covered half the pond, and people (read: tourists) would toss rocks, change, or small children at them.

We next walked through the Place de la Concorde, filled with fountains and statues and the Obelisk. The Obelisk is a little unique among the Egyptian works in Paris. Most things from Egypt were "given" to Napolean after he conquered Egypt. ("This man has conquered our armies, killed our men and our leaders, and was shamed us all. Quick! Give him our national treasures, along with the last of our dignity!") The Obelisk actually was a gift from Egypt. If I remember correctly, it was for returning most of the treasure and artefacts taken from Egypt.

The Place de la Concorde leads directly into the Champs-Elysees. I was a little underwhelmed by this.
Yeah, it looks nice. Further along, there are shops where a jacket sells for more than I make in a year. Needless to say, I didn't do much shopping. The Champs-Elysees ends with the Arc de Triomphe (as did the tour).

Apparently, the roundabout around this is amoung the worst in Europe, with a car crash happening every half hour.

It was almost time to meet up with Christophe, my first host for the week. I hopped on the metro to Montparnasse. This district has Tour Montparnasse, the tallest and most hated building in Paris. After this fifty-story building was erected, laws were passed to stop any more skyscrapers from popping up in the city proper.

It turns out that Christophe was hosting two others for the nights I would be there. Philip and Maeve were a couple from Ireland backpacking their way towards a farm co-op in southern France, where they would spend two months working and practicing their French. We went out for food and drinks. I ordered the "Aussiette de viande froid." Although I knew what it meant (Plate of cold meat), I expected it to be much better than the translation suggested. I was disappointed.

Christophe lives in Saint Cyr, which is a suburb forty minutes away by train. We bought picnic supplies and had a typical French dinner when we got back (wine, bread, cheese, pate). Quite a day.

Monday morning, Philip, Maeve, and I went to a flea market on the East side of Paris. There were all manner stalls, tents, even people with goods on a towel on the ground. Although the market spanned several blocks and a park, I was still unable to find a good hat (the tragic story of my life).

We met up with Christophe for drinks while Philip went to a drumming class. I had a few good Belguim beers and good times. Afterwards, we did a little shopping and went back to Saint Cyr. Maeve and I made some potato / tomato stew along with red pepper and wilted spinach. We hung out with Christophe and his roommates again that night, listened to some music, and fell asleep once more.