OH MY GOSH

Tuesday night we went to this pub called the Roisin Dubh (pronounced roe-jin-dove), and on the walk there, we ran into our landlord, Oliver! Hahaha he came to the pub with us and we drank with him the entire night! We also took photos with him in the photobooth there. It was an AWESOME and abosolutely HILARIOUS night. I bet not many other study abroad students can say they partied with their landlord!

Also, he was so drunk that I was concerned how he was getting home. Since he didn’t know how he was getting home, I flagged down a cab for him and thew 10 euro at the driver. I’m such a good resident 🙂 free housing, anyone??

Oh yeah!

Christina and I also recently went to Salt Hill, which is about a 30 minute walk from where we live. It’s along the coast, and the view is really beautiful. It would be great to go back there on a warm day and watch the sunset. There’s also a diving board into the water which I know Christina wants to try so I’m sure I’ll get sucked into it too.

I also forgot to mention that when Kelly comes we are planning a day trip to Paris, and an overnight stay in Dublin. That should be fun!

Latest updates

I realize I haven’t blogged in a LONG time – over a month! My apologies. I will do my best to give you the highlights of the past month:

• Mom and Dad visited for the week of St. Patrick’s Day. We had a lot of fun our first night. I took them pub hopping. They seemed to really enjoy themselves. We even met these nice Irishmen who all seemed really scholarly and the one introduced Dad to different kinds of Irish whiskey!

• I took my parents to all the finest pubs and restaurants like The Skeff, The Front Door, Cactus Jacks, Merchants Cafe and Pizza Napoli. The only bad food night we had was surprisingly at the Quays. It’s a great pub but their food was mediocre, if that. I guess The Quays can’t do everything (sigh). It was hilarious though because Dad liked the pizza at Pizza Napoli so much that he went back there later that night after some drinking to get himself three more slices hahaha.

• Mom and Dad seemed to really like Galway City and all my friends. They even joined us for some beer pong and flip cup! Dad was getting super angry because Taylor kept beating him. It was fantastic. Mom ended up being really good at flip cup. I hope we can start including these games at family gatherings 🙂

• Mom and Dad stayed at the House Hotel, which is literally 1 second from my apartment. It was a really nice hotel, too. Everything was pink. EVERYTHING. Ha Dad was being all high maintenance about their room arrangements too. He requested a ridiculous amount of hangers and kept talking about how weird everything was. Maybe he forgot he was in a different country? Haha and he also made sure to ask WHEREVER we were whether they had wi-fi and what the password was. He literally asked EVERYWHERE. Lol okay I’ll stop making fun of him now. It’s just too easy. LOVE YOU (and your quirks) DAD ❤

• We spent a few nights drinking at the hotel bar. Mom and Dad of course made bff’s with all the bartenders.

• Mom and Dad apparently tried to see a castle, but got extremely lost with their phone’s poor navigation and gave up and went back ahaha. They successfully made it to Cliffs of Moher though, so that’s good at least.

• So St. Paddy’s was absolute madness in the best way imaginable. My friends and I woke up and went to the parade. Here is a low down of how the parade looked: every middle schooler in town, dressed up as sea creatures, monsters, and god knows what else, but anything and everything they wore had absolutely NOTHING to do with St. Patrick’s Day or Ireland whatsoever; there were a bunch of awkwardly serious protests about some government crap that NO ONE cared about because all we wanted to do was drink and be merry; 2 Irish dancers (woo!); actors from what must have been a drama club screaming nonsense at the crowd; little kids spraying water guns at us, and all of us trying to duck or and scream only targeted us even more; and to top it all off, my roommate Allison jumped in the parade to dance with an Irish flag in her hand, in front of these people representing a country that I now don’t remember. All in all, the parade was one of the most random things I’ve ever seen. It looked like they just threw it together the night before and were trying really hard to make us forget it was St. Patrick’s Day. Anyways after the parade my friends and I decided to go into The Kings Head to get a drink. Stupid me forgot my ID and money, so Christina was going to cover for me, but for the first time EVER they ID’d me and refused to serve me without one (guess they’re really strict on Paddy’s Day). I was bummed, so my friend Tom tried to sneak me one and pretend it was for Taylor, who had his ID with him. Tom hands me my drink, and after only 2 sips the bartender comes over and starts yelling at me. I apologized, he took my drink away, and said that if I go back and get my ID he would buy me a pint! Score! But then asked who bought it for me… Stupid me again told him it was Tom… so the a-hole went over and yelled at Tom and told him to finish his pint and leave! C’mon you were SO much nicer to me! RUDE. I felt so bad because Tom was just trying to be a good friend. I made up for it later and bought Tom a drink though, so it’s all good. After that we went back to the apartment and my parents came over. We all went to get lunch at the restaurant next to Kings Head. We all got corn beef and cabbage which was actually really good. Naturally, the rest of the day is a blur. We had a huge dance party at our apartment with all these foreigners, and THE REST IS HISTORY 😉

• The day after Paddy’s my parents and I went to Dublin! We had a great time. The first night we went out to dinner at this delicious restaurant. After we ate we went to a pub that was next door. It seemed like a local pub, and we saw a fight almost break out! Then we took a cab to Temple Bar where we went to this authentic Irish pub that the cab driver recommended. There were really good performers of traditional Irish music, and it was pretty crowded, too. Let me tell ya how awkward it is to get hit on by guys when your parents are around… OF COURSE the ONE night I don’t want anything to do with guys, they all want to talk to me! Haha it was hilarious because they would eye me down, look like they were about to say something, and then see my Dad was sitting next to me. The majority would then either walk away, or there would occasionally be the one who had the guts to talk to Dad hahaha. The one even bought us drinks! There was one point where like 3 guys were PULLING me to go on the dance floor, and my parents were actually egging them on! SO EMBARRASSING. Needless to say, I didn’t go anywhere near that dance floor. LOL Mom was determind to stay until I stopped getting us free alcohol. So the next day Mom and Dad went to the Guinness factory, but since I had already been there, I went on a shopping spree down Grafton Street 🙂 I bought a beautiful skirt and top from Zara, nailpolish from American Apparel, and the COOLEST perfume I’ve ever smelled in my life, from, of course, LUSH. I wrote an article about my experience at LUSH, but I’ll summarize it here, too. So I was determind to get new perfume because the one I bought previously had spilled all over everything so I had to throw it out. The very first perfume I was drawn to was called “Lord of Goathorn,” which I remembered from my last visit to the store. It has a very unique smell, like seaweed and mermaids haha (that’s the best way I can think of to describe it). Then I found out from the worker that each LUSH store is only allowed to keep ONE bottle of that fragrance. In fact, it’s the company’s most special and unique fragrance, she said. Meant to be or what?! Freaky. So obviously I bought it, and as I cheerfully walked out the door, the worker said, “Enjoy being one of the most special girls in the world.” She nearly brought me to tears! One of the nicest things anyone has every said to me. I’ll never forget it. So after that wonderful day, my parents and I met up and went to the Jameson factory, it was really cool. Dad got to do a whiskey tasting at the end, too, which was fun. After that we went back to Galway!

• I can’t remember anything particularly eventful from the rest of my parent’s stay. I think that about overs it.

• So classes are over now. Spring break just ended, and we have now until the end of April for exams. I have 4 papers to write, and only one actual exam, which is on April 29th. After that I’m done!!! Christina and I have booked all our flights for our final and biggest trip to: Budapest, Prague, Krakow, Barcelona and Rome! I’M SO EXCITED OMG. It’s an 11 day trip. It’s going to be insane. Can’t wait.

• I also found out that Kelly is coming to visit!!!!! I think she’s coming May 21-31. She’s going to fly home with me yaaaaay 😀

• Christina and I made each other Easter baskets 🙂 we knew each other’s favorite stuff, so it was adorable. She got me a can of Coke and keptchup and orange chocolate. So thoughtful ❤

• I finally sent out all my postcards and letters: 27 postcards, 5 letters, and 2 little packages! Exhausting stuff, but all worth it because I know everyone appreciates it.

• I recently watched an AMAZING movie: Mr Magorium’s Wonder Emporium. It’s with Natalie Portman, and it’s about this 240 year old man who owns a magic toy shop. It’s a true delight. My absolute favorite movie at the moment.

I can’t think of anything else right now. If stuff comes to me I’ll be sure to add it!

Oh yeah…

That picture at the top of my blog, where is that? I’d like to go.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LIZ IS COMING TODAY. YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW EXCITED I AM.

AMSTERDAM!

AH! Amsterdam was AMAZING. Definitely my favorite place besides Galway.

So we left Saturday at 7 in the morning the catch the 7:30 bus to Dublin. Woke up that morning with a pretty bad ear ache, but I took some ipuprofen and the pain went away.

Our flight left around 2pm. My ears always hurt on planes, and they’ve been definitely hurting a lot each time I travel around here, but this time was the worst I’ve ever experienced in my life. The pain became so unbearable at one point that I was screaming. Literally. Screaming and clutching onto Christina for dear life. Then my ear drum ruptured and started bleeding. I was freaking out. The flight attendants had to talk over the mic for someone who was medically certified. It ended up being this Dutch girl who was a nurse and she was talking to me, basically saying all the generic stuff that I already did, like plugging your nose to pop your ears, chewing gum, ibuprofen, yawning, etc. None of that worked. It was horrible. Unfortunately there wasn’t anything else they could do for me. Luckily it was a short flight. When we got off they had arranged for an abulence to be there. They weren’t much help either because they are trained for emergency situations not ear pain. They basically just told me to find a doctor once I got to Amsterdam.

So that was fun. After that Christina and I caught a bus to Amsterdam, which was about 2 hours away. Once we got to the city I was completely mesmerized. At this time it was like 7pm. The buildings and the lights were so pretty. The city was big but tight and crammed at the same time. We walked around and eventually found our hostel, which was really close to central station where we were dropped off.

Ha. Our hostel was in the red light district by the way, and pretty much in the center of all the night life. So after we got settled in we went to find a place for dinner. We ended up at this Spanish restaurant. I had this really good chicken and Christina ate Quale (I tried a piece – EW). After that we went walking around to find a place to go. We bar hopped a few places. It was fun.

The next day we went shopping around the streets near our hostel. There were a lot of cool shops. Oh yeah but we had breakfast at The Cheese Factory. BOY WAS THAT DELICIOUS. There were eggs and bread and all these different cheeses to try. Mmmmmm.

For dinner, OH! That was a huge fail. Listen to this. We were walking around looking for a place to eat, and we stumbled across this little Italian place. We were reading the menu outside when the waitor came out and invited us in… we didn’t know how to say no. The place was tiny inside and had a creepy vibe. Christina was having trouble deciding what to order, so she asked the waitor what was their best dish. He had nothing to say and looked really confused. He just started pointing to the menu and describing what each meal was… OKAY WE CAN READ. She said I’m just asking which one is the best, and he’s like, “Well, what do you like? This one is pasta with chicken, this one pasta with fish….” He obviously wasn’t getting it. I ended up ordering this spicy chicken pasta and Christina ordered a 3 cheese pasta. And when we got our food… it looked DISGUSTING. The noodles were this off white gross color, and the chicken looked like it was rubber. I had a bite… IT WAS TERRIBLE. It was probably one of the worst things I have ever tasted. Christina felt the same way about hers. I refused to take another bite. We waited there for probably 15 minutes without service. Then I called him over and told him that we weren’t happy with our meals and would like to leave. You should have seen how mad this guy got. I was a little scared, but I held my ground. He was like, “Well you guys just don’t know what you like! What’s wrong with it?” Worst service I’ve ever gotten. Normally I would have flipped out on this guy, but since we were foreigners I thought I should just play it safe. So after arguing for a few minutes I ultimately told him that we would just like to pay for it and leave. UGH I WAS SO ANGRY.

After we got he heck out of there, Christina and I wandered around for another place. We found the Burger Bar. It was really good. Reminded me of Five Guys.

That night we went out once again. Oh yeah our hostel also had the biggest sports bar there is in Amsterdam. We pre-gamed there pretty much every night.

I don’t remember exactly which night this was, but Christina and I got lost in the red light district! That place really freaked me out. One of the girls made eye contact with me once too. Can’t get that image out of my head! If you hang out in there too long it will really give you a strange view of humanity.

Oh yeah and we also tried out this fast food place called Feebo. It’s basically like one big vending machine. You put the money into the slot, and then you open one of the doors for whatever food you want! It’s probably super unhealthy, but it was good late night food! We went back there like 3 times over the course of our trip haha. I always got this fried macaroni thing.

Hmmm what else… Oh yeah so on Monday I went to the doctors. I got a phone number from the guy in the hostel. The people there weren’t really helpful at all, but they gave me steriods, antibiotics and nasal spray. The doctor said if I use that it should all prevent my ears from hurting again.

Then we went to the pharmacy to get my perscription filled. It cost 50 euro for the appointment, and another 40 euro for the medicine… but hey, I was willing to pay anything at that point.

After that we walked around Amsterdam for a while. It is really a beautiful city. I loved the canals and all the boats and bikes. We stopped for lunch and got grilled cheese and tomato soup. Yum. Oh and we asked for coffee and they gave it to us in these cute itty bitty mugs. I want some!

Later in the day we went on a coffee shop tour! It was awesome. Our tour guide was really knowledgable and funny. All the history was interesting. We even got to see the Cannibis College! It was so cool.

Later that night Christina and I went to dinner at this restaurant in the red light district. I don’t remember what it’s called, but we both ordered pumpkin cheese ravioli. IT WAS SO GOOD OMG. We ate it in like a second. Then we had tiramisu for dessert… mmmm food heaven.

We bar hopped that night once again. Oh I forgot to mention we met quite a few British and Irish guys. I felt like they were everywhere. And we also met Canadians!

So now I think we’re on Tuesday, our last day/night. Christina and I call this day, “Anne Frank and pancakes” because we started the day at a pancake place right next to Anne Frank’s house. I had a banana rum pancake, and IT WAS THE BEST PANCAKE I’VE EVER HAD IN MY LIFE. The only thing was the rum was pretty strong, so I had to chase each bite with a bite of Christina’s pancake. Haha.

So then we went to Anne Frank’s. That was really interesting. Bought some nice postcards there too.

Then Christina and I went wandering around Amsterdan trying to find the Van Gogh museum. We went into this convenient store where they had ALL FOODS AMERICAN. Like Kraft mac and cheese, Peter Pan and Jiff  peanut butter, CHEESE ITS, ROOT BEER, etc. We were so excited and making fools out of ourselves. We had huge arm fulls of food when we realized we couldn’t take all that on the plane haha. So we decided to just take the mac and cheese, root beer, and cheese its for the road.

So here we are, walking around Amsterdam, eating cheese its… when all of a sudden this man is walking in between us. IT WAS OUR TOUR GUIDE FROM THE DAY BEFORE. Hahahah we were laughing so hard. What are the odds? We decided to take advantage of his expertise and ask him where the Van Gogh museum was. Turns out we were on the complete opposite end of town haha. So we gave up. AND WENT SHOPPING.

We found Dam Square and the H&M there was huge. 5 stories. It was cool because all the clothes there were European style that you would never find in the states. I bought a dress and Christina bought a top.

For dinner, we went back to that same restaurant in the red light discrict because we loved that ravioli so much that we wanted it again haha. This time we got the large instead of the regular size. Again ate it in a second. We didn’t have room for dessert this time.

More bar hopping that night. More fun.

Sadly, Wednesday came and we had to leave. Fortunately this time on the plane my ears didn’t really hurt. The left one (the one that didn’t pop) hurt a little bit, but then I just yawned and drank a Heinekin in 45 seconds. I was so scared of it hurting again. But I guess the medicine and beer did the trick!

In conclusion…

AMSTERDAM IS AMAZING. I will definitely go back one day. Loved every second of that trip.

Another side note…

Remember me mentioning Merchants Cafe? The cafe right next to my apartment? Well, I go there almost every day, so I’ve become pretty close to the workers there. I now can walk in, the owner greets me as “Buffalo girl,” and then I order “the usual.” Ha it’s pretty awesome! Totally my Tim Hortons of Galway.

Also, the bus station in Dublin HAD A TIM HORTONS INSIDE. UNREAL.

Side note…

One of the workers at Charcoal Grill, the Turkish kabob place in Galway, now has my phone number and is going to call me when they have baklava 😀

LONDON

Once again, writing this late, but last weekend Christina and I went to London!

It took us pretty much a whole day to travel there. We left at 2 in the morning, had to take a 3 hour bus to the Dublin airport, waited there for another few hours, plane left at 8am, got to London at 9am, took a 30 min train to King’s Cross Station, took a 5 min cab to our hostel. PHEW! It was quite the trip, but we got there!

Our hostel was really cool – it’s in an old courthouse. They had all these really modern furniture and lighting with funny quotes everywhere. The common room was literally in the old courtroom. There was a desk at the judges table, a seating area at the witness stand and jury area. It was cool! The couches were AWESOME. I wish I could describe them on here. Ugh I didn’t even get a picture. But I WILL have one in my house someday. Christina and I were so exhausted from our travels that we fell asleep sitting up on them hahaha that’s how comfy they were.

After we settled in, we decided to go out and explore. We found a little cafe to have sandwiches for lunch, then we ventured down to the tube station! Surprisingly we figured out how to use the tube really well. Christina said the tube in London is way easier to use than the one in NYC.

So anyways we took the tube down to Harrod’s! HOLY CRAPOLA. Harrod’s will totally be my go-to place when I’m rich and visiting London. They sell every fancy designer known to man. They have multiple restaurants, and an accessories room, a cheese room, a wine room, a watch room, A JEWELY ROOM. The jewelry was incredible. Christina and I were drooling over the wedding rings:) OH! and they had a grocery store that puts Wegman’s to shame. The chandeliers had fruit on them! I can’t believe that’s how rich people eat. You could tell that we were standing among the wealthiest people in London. On the walk there we passed all these beautiful apartments and a BUNCH of luxury cars. We saw a Mazerati (NO idea how to spell it and don’t really care), well at least Christina saw it. She took a picture of it too. It’s funny how I don’t notice those things haha.

So yeah the only thing we ended up buying was Turkish baklava. It was really good. There were 4 more floors apparently, but we knew it was probably just beautiful clothes and shoes that we couldn’t afford. Next time!

We were starving after that so we went into this nearby Italian restaurant. It was SUPER Italian. Literally the waiters spoke only Italian to each other and seemed like they knew little English haaha. But we got to sit right next to the kitchen so that was cool. The chef was this cute old man who spoke not even a word of English. He could tell we were impressed with him so he started to show off towards the end 🙂 It was adorable. Our waiters were adorable too. And the food. OH THE FOOD. God I love that Italians exist. I cannot WAIT to go to Italy and eat my face off.

After that we hopped back on the tube back to our hostel. We took an hour nap, got changed, and went down to the basement of our hostel where there is a bar/club! It was really nice down there actually. There was a good DJ playing, and the drinks were relatively cheap. Oh by the way, NO ONE in London knows how to pour a pint of Guinness. They don’t even tilt the glass when they pour it, which it just improper beer etiquette to begin with. Ugh. So much foam. So annoying. I should sign them up for the Guinness Academy or just go behind the bar myself and teach them a thing or two.

So the bar was fun though. We met some guys from Denmark which was really random and cool haha. They were a little weird, but oh well.

The next day Christina and I spent the good first half of our day getting ready and trying to plan what we were gonna do. I was having trouble with my debit card because the ATM wasn’t letting me take out money. So I was struggling on the phone with Capital One. Eventually got it figured out though – I just had to tell them I was in London so they could activate my card again. We also had technical difficulties trying to make reservations online for the Ice Bar. It kept asking for the State we live, but there was no field to enter it! After about 10 tries we gave up and tried calling their customer service line, but no one was picking up! They said they open at 1pm, and it was 1:10 and no one was answering. Uh, obviously someone came into work late that day. So we gave up and decided to go out and call them later.

We went to Lunch at the St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel. Sounds fancy, and IT SURE WAS. IT was intimidating how big this place was. We walked up the stairs and went inside to be greeted by the little man standing in a MASSIVE room in a black tux. We were like, uh, we’re here to eat? Apparently there were two restaurants. We ended up at The Booking Office. It’s called the Booking Office because I’m pretty sure the entire hotel used to be a part of the train station that is now right next door. We were literally eating in the old booking office I’m pretty sure. I tried to get some pictures of this place but none of them would do it justice.

So the lunch was fancy shmancy. 15 pounds for a sandwich :O ! It was really good though. Hahah it was really funny because I was in a spazzy mood. I managed to somehow break the tea pot they gave me and spill my tea all over the table. Our waiter saw that I was struggling from a distance so he came to help me out hahaha. So embarrassing. Then after getting a new tea pot, I referred to the plate our food was on as a “rock.” Christina said it was slate. I also thought the red stuff on the “slate” was ketchup. Nope. That was some pepper paste thing. I also referred to the salad as “leaves.” But hey, that’s what they looked like to me! I don’t know, I guess I’m just not sophisticated enough for these kind of meals. One day when I can afford something at Harrod’s I’ll go back there and redeem myself:)

After lunch we went back to the hostel to try calling the Ice Bar again. Well, they actually picked up this time, but THEY WERE BOOKED FOR THE DAY. So disappointing. Maybe if your website worked and you actually came to work on time this wouldn’t have happened! Oh well.

After that we went to the London Eye, which was AMAZING. For those that don’t know, it’s this massive ferris wheel. We got the BEST view of London at nighttime. I took lots of pics. After that we walked right on over to Big Ben. It was so surreal to see it in real life after seeing so many pictures of it. Took more pics. Then we went to a nearby restaurant. I had thi Sunday roast with beef and a bunch of veggies. It was good! I also tried another pint of Guinness which was a fail. It tasted like water. We went down to the bar after and got another drink. The bartender recommended we get Guinness with Tia Maria in it. IT WAS SO GOOD. Finally a Guinness success in London.

After that we went back to the hostel, got changed and stuff and went back down to the bar at the hostel. This time I didn’t drink Guinness, and we met Italians! They were nice. Hung out with them the majority of the night. Went to bed real late. Oh and we also met an Australian who had a stuffed animal snake wrapped around his neck. Claimed to have gotten it from the bartender downstairs because it was the day of the Chinese new year, and it’s the year of the snake. Haha he was really funny. He was also boasting about how he’s a referee for NCAA basketball and gets to travel the world and stuff. He said he’s “pretty talented” and that we should be on the lookout for him at the next Olympics. Ha. Okay mate. We saw him the next morning and when we asked how he was, he said he felt like he was “recovering from an autopsy” hahaha told you he was funny!

So the last morning Christina and I went back to St. Pancras Station. After about an hour of searching, we found Platform 9 3/4 from Harry Potter! That was cool.

Then we began out trip back to our home away from home. Half hour train to London Luton Airport, stayed in the airport for about 6 hours, plane left at 5:50pm, got to Dublin around 7pm, took the bus back to Galway. We were finally home by 11pm. PHEW. Boy were we glad to be home. We missed Galway so much! So we went out to the Quays and had a few drinks of course 🙂

So London was definitely cool, but once again, I haven’t found any place yet that’s better than Galway!

DUBLIN

Yeah, I’m writing this late, but two weekends ago Christina and I went to Dublin. It was really fun!

I’m realizing now how much of a daunting task it is to plan trips though. Bus passes, hostels, where to go and how to get there, what to pack… There’s so much preparation! I know I was a little overwhelmed by it, because I didn’t know how the bus system worked, but we managed to figure it out.

It was a 3 hour bus ride to Dublin from Galway. We left Friday afternoon. The bus/train station is conveniently really close to our apartment so that’s good to know. WOW was the bus nice! Leather reclining seats, free wifi and so much leg room! Christina and I were impressed. Ridin’ in style 🙂

So naturally I really enjoyed the ride over there. We arrived in Dublin around 7 if I remember correctly. We had no idea how to get to our hostel though, so we settled for a cab.

The hostel was nice. About what I expected. We shared a co-ed room with 8 other people. A lot of them would come and go, so we got to meet quite a few people. Only thing was only one of those people spoke English! Haha Christina and I were trying to be all friendly with them, and they would just smile and stare at us. Awkward…

Anyways, the workers behind the counter at the hostel were really cool. They recommended a place for Christina and I to eat dinner. It was called Gallagher’s Boxty House. A boxty is basically a pancake with ramdom stuff inside. The one I got had beef and potatoes and a garlic sauce. I surprisingly really liked it! OMG another cool thing about the restaurant is they serve all different kinds of aged whiskey. I forgot the name of the drink I ordered, but it had lime and gingerale in it. It was so strong but still good! Christina got a Bloody Molly haha she let me try a sip. It was WAY stronger than mine and it was disgusting lol. I think Christina liked it though minus the really strong part. Man did we feel those drinks! Haha we ended up having a blast at dinner though. We were just constantly laughing and we ended up holding hands confessing our love for each other? HA gotta love us. I’m sure everyone thought we were weird.

So after dinner we went back to the room and briefly, then we went walking around the Temple Bar area looking for a place to go. We were so excited when we saw a place called the Quays!! Obviously we had to go in, but I ended up hating it there. It was ridiculously crowded. Jam packed. When we finally got to the bar, I accidently elbowed the man behind me and hit his glass of water. I apologized, but then he started flipping out! He was like, “Really??? You just hit my glass?? REALLY?” He seemed astonished at what had just happened. I was really confused because I didn’t even hit him that hard and no water spilled! But then he noticed that the glass was cracked and blamed me for it? He was like, “I cannot believe you cracked the glass!” Just thinking about his face makes me laugh hahaha. You should have seen how wide his eyes were. I did not understand why he was acting all surprised. We’re in a SUPER crowded pub, people are going to bump into each other. SORRY if I “cracked” your glass, but I don’t even think I hit it hard enough for that to have been possible! Anyways, after that Christina and I were done with the Dublin Quays so we left to look for somewhere better.

Hahaha on our walk we found a huge guy dressed as a leprochaun (if that’s how you spell it). He looked like a huge leprochaun mascot or something it was really funny. Christina got a pictuer with him hahaha.

So we found the Temple Bar. We’ve heard all about it so we decided to go in. It was still crowded, but not as bad as the Quays was. The band there was really good. We eack got a drink then sat down outside. OMG the outside patio was so pretty!! They had all these outdoor heaters and cool red xmas lights. Loved it. So we hung out there for a while then eventually went back to our hostel. I had acutally had a good night sleep.

The next morning we got to take LONG HOT SHOWERS. I think that will become my favorite part of traveling and maybe even my main motivation to travel. Well, maybe not the main motivation, but it’s definitely high on the list. We ate out complimentary dry breakfast and crappy coffee. But I mean, it’s a hostel, so I’ll take what I can get!

Once we made ourselves decent we went down Grafton Street to do some shopping! It was such a lovely day. Sunny and in the 40s. Christina convinced me to go into this store called LUSH, which sells all organic beauty products. Right now, LUSH is BY FAR my new favorite store. The girl that worked there was mad cool. Turns out she’s from Galway! She said that Galway is the “most chill” place in Ireland! She showed us their AMAZING make-up line called “Emotional Brilliance.” Basically, the whole idea is that the colors we choose say a lot about our mindet at that point in time. She showed us this color wheel, and we had to pick the 3 colors that immediately stood out to us the most. The first color we choose then represents our current strength, the second is our subconscious, and the third is your aspiration. My strength ended up being Passion, which was this bright pink lip color. I OBVIOUSLY bought it! I’m in love.

OMG. ALSO. She showed us their frangrance collection. Wow were they amazing. They consider perfume as a way of expression. Each scent is based on its own story that the two guys who made it experiences throughout their lives. They have some really awesome and weird ones. I ended up buying “Voice of Reason” which was based on these guys living in the hippy era and going to bars and partying and stuff. The smell makes me think of a little hole-in-the-wall pub. It smells sort of like a campfire too. IT’S SO COOL. It also really reminds me of Galway, which is probably the main reason I bought it. I call it the smell of Galway 🙂 I was also SO inspired by this store that I made it the topic of my article for the Griffin. Oh! By the way, you guys can all read my articles online at canisiusgriffin.com. They don’t have the pictures up or anything, but at least you can get to read them!

So after some shopping we had a nice lunch at a hotel nearby. THEN WE WENT TO THE GUINNESS STOREHOUSE. It was so much fun. I don’t always like museums, but this one was really well done and really interesting! I would highly recommend it to anyone that is in Dublin. There were 5 floors that were constructed into the largest pint glass in the world! I also attended the Guinness Academy where I learned the 6 steps to pouring the perfect pint of Guinness! I got a diploma and everything 😀 oh and the top floor was a pub where all the walls were windows so you could get a 360 view of Dublin! You could see the mountains in the distance and everything. It was beautiful. After that we went to the gift shop where I got lots of goodies for my peeps back home 🙂

After that we went to Leo Burdocks for dinner. Christina heard about the place because it was on the Travel Channel! They have authentic Fish and Chips there. It was delicious!

Then we went back to the hostel to get ready for the night. We ended up going to this nice pub, but I don’t remember what it was called. It wasn’t overly crowded, so that was nice. We met Australians! They were fun. Hung out with them the entire night. HA. Okay so Christina and I were on a hunt all day/night to find a place that was going to be playing the Super Bowl. No one knew of anywhere that would play it! Later we found out why: IT WAS SATURDAY. The Super Bowl is on Sundays hahahaha we felt like such idiots. My excuse was that I’m an idiot when it comes to sports. Christina did have as much of an excuse LOL. So anyways we got some fast food from a Turkish kabob place (man, people really like Turkish food here) and the one Australian came back and hung out at the hostel with us for a little while. Fun night!

Overall, Dublin was cool, but nothing can compare to Galway 🙂