Irish Days...

Winter school ended a week and a half ago. It was hard to say goodbye to not only my friends, but everything that Winter school was. I expect to see a lot of those people who I am close to again, but I will never be in the same place with all those same people again and that’s a hard reality to grasp.

At our banquet, L to R: Peggy, Shelby, (me), Amelia and Alysa

On the Loop in the brisk English weather, L to R: Shelby, Peggy, Jacob, Shinseung, Trevor, Alysa, Karina, Amelia, (me)

After winter school ended, I stayed on volunteer staff for a few days before leaving for Ireland. I really only worked one and a half days out of the four that I was there and I also helped with clean after meals on the days off. I really enjoyed myself last weekend. I got to spend some more time with a couple of my close friends and develop deeper friendships with a couple others. We had such a good time. It makes me look forward to going back to do the same in just a couple days.

Making eggs for Sunday breakfast.

Jacob playing with the sheep.

Grant playing with the sheep.

Jun making us delicious Korean noodles!

On Tuesday, I left with my friend Karina (from the Seattle area) to go to Dublin. We were able to stay with a cousin of my friends, who lives in a great location in Dublin city. We were in Dublin for a total of 4 nights. On the day we got here, we met up with one of our friends, Amelia, and her friend (also from the Seattle area) to go to The Temple Bar in the Temple Bar district in the city. The beer drinking stereotype of Ireland is not a joke! That bar was a hoppin’ place...and it was a Tuesday night!

On Wednesday morning, we wandered around the city with a few goals in mind. We ended up in the National Gallery of Ireland, which I enjoyed a lot. We didn’t make it through the whole thing, but I saw paintings by van Gogh, Rembrandt, Picasso and Michelangelo. There was a whole room dedicated to the story of Jesus’ birth, as well as one dedicated to his death and resurrection. It was so interesting to look at the different ways that artists portrayed Jesus and the other people who were present. We also did a lot of window shopping that day and simply enjoyed walking the streets of Dublin...in the snow (we preferred it to rain)! That afternoon we made our way to the Guinness factory...because you can’t go to Dublin without going to the Guinness factory! We learned about the ingredients and process of making beer and the history behind Guinness. Interesting fact: Arthur Guinness signed a contract for their factory building for 9,000 years! I received a certificate for successfully pouring a perfect pint. At the top of the building was a great view of the whole city. After that, we got a bite to eat and headed back to the house. Karina and I have basically been living on white bread and Nutella sandwiches and apples. Blech! Yay for travelling cheap!

On Thursday morning, we woke up really early to catch a coach for a tour to the cliffs of Moher on the west coast of Ireland. The four of us did the tour together. It took about two and a half hours to drive from the east coast to the west coast in Galway. Once we got to Galway, our tour officially began. On the way to the cliffs, we made several stops at various places including castles, old churches, Celtic burial grounds, the Burren and a few others. The cliffs were definitely a highlight, though. They currently rank number 4 on the natural wonders of the world. It was absolutely gorgeous. Pictures don’t do it justice by any means (but I’ll post some anyway). In fact as I sit here to think of a way to describe it, it seems impossible. They were the most incredible, lethal, beautiful, and most intricate design of cliffs I’ve ever seen. They had God’s fingerprints all over them. Fun fact: they appear in the movie The Princess Bride as the cliffs of Insanity and the 6^th Harry Potter when Harry and Dumbledore are looking for a horcrux. That tour/day was probably my highlight of the whole trip. Riding back along the coast was gorgeous too. I love the Irish countryside!

Friday we just took the day to relax a little bit. We had seen what we most wanted to so we made French toast and eggs and then hung out at a cafe and got some internet in the morning. In the afternoon we went to a boy’s choir service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral (yes, I went to St. Patrick’s cathedral in Ireland...). The service was great. The choir was beautiful and I really appreciated what the priest has to say about it being Good Friday and how we often respond to it. (Interesting fact: on Good Friday, all of Ireland shuts down the selling of alcohol...not only are bars closed, but they are not allowed to sell it in stores either.) We window shopped our way back to the house and made dinner and had an early night.

This morning we woke up at a quarter to three and got a taxi to the airport at 3:30am! Karina and I are in Paris now. Unfortunately we only have two full days here because we leave early on Tuesday morning. We haven’t done much today because we are so tired and we are not too confident about going into the city because we want to try to be back into the house before it gets dark. So today we got groceries to last us two and a half days and walked to a creperie to enjoy some fresh, genuine crepes! Tomorrow we are off to Hillsong Paris for Easter Sunday and after that...plenty of sightseeing!