Greetings from Dublin, Ireland

It’s absolutely beautiful and wonderful over here.

We arrived yesterday at 9:50 am local time…Ireland is 5 ahead of eastern time. The plane ride was 8 hours. Basically I went 24 hours with maybe 3 hours of sleep. So when we arrived, to say I was tired is a gross understatement. However, all was not lost on the plane ride. I had an absolutely delightful time sitting in first class. My co-worker and I made it pretty obvious that it was our first time in an overseas first class seat. We over ate, but I’m proud to announce that we didn’t over drink. One major take away - I listened to the Madonna CD, “Hard Candy,” on the plane and I give it two thumbs up. Timberland and Pharell produced the majority of the songs, and it’s a high energy dance CD. I purchased the CD at a HMV here in Dublin.

Okay, so we get off the plane…the first thing we do is drop our bags off at our hotel. Unfortunately we couldn’t check in. We decided to stay at “The Modern,” in Temple Bar. Temple Bar is an area South of the Luffie River that is equivalent to Buckhead/Pharr Street bar scene circa 2001, (the year that I got way too intoxicated and had to take it back to the house by 11:00 pm). After we dropped our bags off, we went to an information/tour plaza where I exchanged my $180 in exchange for NO 120 Euros. Yeah, that kinda hurt. We also bough city tour bus tickets. Before boarding the bus, we found a cafe in Temple Bar where I sat down and had a delicious coffee. I requested milk and sugar to decorate my coffee. They brought out milk and what I thought were rocks…however, it was simply sugar. lol. I can be so simple at times.

After we finished the coffee, I had enough energy to do the bus ride. The bus tour took us around the major streets of Dublin. I saw the Guiness Compound - the place is HUGE. Other things of note that we saw: Pheonix Park (2 times as big as Central Park), Trinity College, and some other stuff. lol…I must say stuff because at one point on the bus ride, I fell the hell asleep. KNOCKED OUT.

After the bus ride we headed back to our hotel; however, we were not quite starving, yet a tid bit hungry. There was an open food market in Temple Bar and we walked around. Initially we were going to pass it up, because nothing tickled our fancy. However, I spotted the largest oyster shells that I’ve ever seen. Knowing that Dublin is a hop skip and a jump from water, I figured that the oysters would be amazing. Well, I sure was right. They were HUGE and tasted just like the ocean smells. Perfect…they even had Tobacco sauce! Delicious!

From there we went back to the hotel and checked in. At this point it was about 4:30 local time. I took a much needed shower and then we slept until about 7:00. We woke up ready to take the world on. Temple Bar at this time was packed to the brim with crazy Irish Folks.

As an aside. I’m not sure what I expected Irish people to look like. Some over generalizations, they are of course pale. Dark hair. And a handful of them have beautifully blue or green piercing eyes. There really aren’t black people as I know them to be in America. I saw people of direct African decent; however, most black people in America are muts that don’t truly resemble Africans.

We found an Italian place to eat. Interesting, Italian food is supposed to be some of the best. So anywho, we did Italian food. After that, we stepped inside of one of the rowdy bars in Temple Bar. It was packed to the brim with people drinking beer. I walked in and became somewhat of a wonder. People did look at me. A handful of men tried to speak to me. Between the drunk slur and Irish accent, and loud music, I could not make out much of what they were saying. We made our way to the bar, and some short Irish man was being facetious with me. I ordered a red bull and vodka - safety drink, plus I needed a boost of energy. We chatted a bit with the older Irish lads. Random other Irish lads would stop and talk to me. We found a corner to stand in and some guy from Poland tried his best attempt at flirting with me. However, after seeing his scarey tattoo, which he said, “it’s a tattoo of my monster,” my coworker and I made a fresh exit when he went to the bar for his next drink.

We walked away from Temple Bar, as it seemed like it was full of the Fighting Irish. We ventured slightly away and came upon a lovely wine bar. My coworker and I have a very casual relationship; however, traveling iwth a person for two weeks forces a relationship upon you. I’m pleasantly surprised. We shared a bottle of a lovely, deep oaky and spicey red-wine and talked about men, politics, and work gossip. For the most part we are on the same page. We’re twenty-something women who have come thus far successfully and have trouble being comfortable being vulnerable in a relationship. All is well in the world.

After we finished our bottle of wine, we merrily walked down the street. We made our way back to the rowdy Temple Bar area and continued walking up the cobble stone street. We were quite amazed with the women wearing barely nothing and stillettos. First of all, it was like 55 degrees outside, second of all, cobble stones + stillettos = disaster. We stopped to listen to a band playing on the side of the street that gained a pretty large audience.

We continued walking and along come two drunk Irish men. Mind you, a guy here or there would stop to look at me as if he’d never seen a black woman before. They’re prety complimentary…and eyyy - who am I to deny a compliment. So anywho these two come along and want to go dancing. Well by golly, we followed them to a half way decent dance club. They were playing familiar music (losts of songs produced by Timberland and then older 80s American hits). The only thing of note that happened was that I tasted my first taste of Guiness. I like it. I wouldn’t buy a pack and bring it home or anything, but I was pleasantly surprised. Especially given that my first drink of beer was Natty Lite. So anything above and beyond that is a step in the right direction. We all danced a bit, and then they got a bit creepy. So my coworker and I decided to call it a night.

And that was my first 24 hours in Dublin, Ireland.