Home to...Dublin

For the past three nights, I've been living the good life in Dublin. My definition of "the good life" may be different from what you think it means, or what you think it means to me, so I'll explain a little further. Because this is the end of my trip, and I've been staying in hostels or on people's couches for the past six weeks, I decided to treat myself to a hotel room. A hotel room! The first night, I barricaded myself in this room and turned on the TV. Disappointed? If it makes anyone feel better (myself included), I'll have you all know that I actually went for a run around the area that same night, and the familiarity of the area hit me like a brick wall. My dad and I took a trip here last year for my birthday, and everything I remember from the trip still corresponds perfectly with the actual city! This helped rationalize my need for isolation in privacy and free me to roam around the city to find amazing coffee shops to write in--thanks Kara for the Cake Cafe recommendation!

Sure, this lifestyle would get a tad lonely, but the combination of desperately needing my own space and knowing that Erin would get here in a few days leveled out being an absolute bum quite nicely. To be fair, I have walked around some and I have visited to the National Gallery and James Joyce Centre, but that's nothing like what I've done in past cities, or what I will do when Erin joins me TODAY! We're meeting up at the airport this afternoon, immediately heading to the bar, then to Cork for two nights, back to Dublin for two more, and then I'm on my flight home...with a 17 hour layover in Madrid. Yes, guys, the countdown to my return has begun. It's a really complicated string of emotions involved here, that got even more complicated after last night.
 
So last night, guess who showed up to Dublin? My Australian friend, Amy! How appropriate is it that we met in Munich when we were both starting out our trips, again in Amsterdam in the midst of traveling issues, and now again at the end when we are both well-worn travelers? Last night, we first met up at the restaurant, Cornucopia, and then traveled over to the Stag's Head bar, and then to the Ha' Penny Bridge pub. The first bar we went to is one of the most famous in Dublin and is one of the last that remains in the style of long bars all Irish bars used to have. The second, is one of those bars in the party district of Dublin, Temple Bar area, where the majority of people there are tourists. This was seen in its extreme case last night on the eve of St. Patrick's Day and at the comedy show Amy and I decided to attend.


Picture this scene: four Irish comedians have to go on stage in front of a multicultural group, where a sizable portion doesn't even speak English fluently and even those that do won't understand the culturally Irish jokes that they are used to making. They also realize that they are on stage in front of a bunch of tourists who have made the trek to enjoy a holiday that is associated with Ireland, but is not celebrated here to the extant it is everywhere else in the world. How awkward is this situation? Queue the stereotypes. Normally the American stereotype and typical America jokes don't affect me that much; I'm usually able to recognize that I reflect this stereotype very little apart from my accent. However, being surrounded by Americans that invite the jokes and perpetuate this stereotype was an entirely different situation. For example, one girl was rude, interrupted the comics and was overly pro-America; the other was studying politics and claimed she was going to run for presidency. C'mon guys. Give me a break here.

Not Irish, Finnish

The comedians may have gone a little far, Amy even said so, but I really couldn't blame them. It just seems like the world keeps taking everything from the Irish: their land, their identity and now their holiday? Just seems a little rough to me, which would also help explain their incredible drive to revive their language. One comic actually started doing his routine in Irish in front of everyone just to prove a point. The way I see last night was just a mutual abuse of cultures where every stereotype was reinforced and the jokes justified. One thing this trip has definitely given me is a new appreciation of America and some sort of patriotism that was not there before leaving the States. But with this is a new found frustration at how America portrays itself to the world--probably because now, instead of seeing myself as outside the cracks at the USA, I find myself dead center. Hence, the increased complication in my feelings about returning to the good ole US of A.

Well, Happy St. Pat's Day! I'll be running off to Cork with Erin in about 4 hours!