My day didn't start off too well: I took a taxi to get to PaddyWagon because I was afraid I'd have to run all the way or be late. The taxi driver was undercharging me (or I thought so), so I asked him if he was sure he was giving me the right change (I had heard it cost 4 EUR but the meter said 5,85) --I think his ears couldn't believe that I wanted to pay more than what he was asking for, so I had to repeat my explanation/question again. Suddenly, he started yelling and ended up insulting me because he lost a client while we were talking. I opened the front door and gave him 2 more EUR while I said "You didn't need to talk to me like that, I just wanted to pay you more than what you wanted" and his response was "Bitch!"
I went into the office/hostel and introduced myself. They made me wait for the driver, like last week (I was early). I took my jacket off and filled up my water bottle in the bathroom downstairs. I took a few deep breaths for a few minutes, try to calm down after the scene with the taxi driver. I thought about Greg and wondered if he'd be there: since I didn't want to socialize with the whole group right then, I sat somewhere else and started playing Jewels with on my phone (Nexus One, Android). Effectively enough, he came laughing and sat next to me a minute later: he'd seen the phone we were all given last week at work.
Soon the driver came and we took off. The drive was nice, the water on the side of the road frozen. We were announced before departure, in fact, that the trip would take a route different than planned because the roads in the mountains were too slippery to drive on. The new plan sounded very interesting: visiting the ruins of a castle.
I loved the spot. You can tell on the pictures that the sun or its absence changed the views a lot, so I'm very grateful that it was sunny most of the day!
It was otherwise extremely windy at the top of the hill, but not too bad at the bottom, where the bus waited for us.
We departed, made a coffee and pee stop and made our way to Kilkenny. Before getting to the town our guide told us very interesting stuff about the most popular sports in Ireland, relating that to the fact that hurling is huge in Kilkenny. Hurling seems to be something like field hockey with flying balls. Greg said it looks very dangerous when you watch a game :-o
Kilkenny was very neat, but smaller than I had imagined it. We walked around town, to the cathedral, along the river and back around the castle. We had a nice lunch in a restaurant on the main street and an espresso in a little, super cute and calm coffeeshop in a smaller street off of the commercial area.
On the way back to Dublin we stopped at a dolmen site for a few minutes: pretty cool too :)Since we were back quite early, I went to Graphton area. I wasn't planning on doing big (post-)Christmas shopping but rather looking for a place where I could buy threat to saw. Of course Graphton was really nice with the Christmas lights still on, people walking down the street but not crowding it and... wait, what is that music?! The sound of very lively music played with tradicional instruments hit my ears and I inevitably headed that way. I was walking toward them thinking I'd leave a tip when I noticed they had CDs for sale. I didn't need to stand there and listen to realize I wanted to buy one, so I just grabbed 10 EUR, put them in a guitar case and took my new album. I stood to hear a couple of songs (they were quite short), and moved on.
A few meters later I stopped at a scarf/hat/glove stall. I looked through many wool hats, tried one on and got it. Walked further and... I just had to go into Clarks because they still have that 50% off: I got myself a super comfortable pair of shoes (I'm sure my mom is very proud of me) for 35 EUR.And sure enough, since I needed some pants I went into some other store and got a pair of jeans and some other pair of slightly more formal pants on sale. Finally, I walked into a health store and got nuts and tea of different kinds that will last me for a while :)
The walk back home was very nice: along the Liffey, I listened to an NPR music show that talked about different topics. Everything was interesting, and it wasn't cold. Life seemed wonderful. And then, the show lead interviewed a young female artist who basically stopped her life to take care of her dad who was dying of cancer --for seven years, till he passed awau. She took care of him and wrote music. And she said at one point: and that's what I did, I wanted to say it, I didn't want to hide it when people would ask where have you been. And a tear fell down my cheek --I felt sad when I thought about my mom.
My wonderful day in the nature, among the ruins, in a little town, near an ancient dolmen, my recent purchases, the nice walk by the river suddenly lost importance. (My eyes are watery again while I write this...) But I made myself go back to listening to the show --that woman is brave and is moving on. Just like the show, which now talks about some band that makes dance and trance music: I concentrated to listen to it and forget and leave behind any sad thoughts. I reached the Grand Canal and just before crossing the bridge, the show was over. Good timing, I'm getting home.Check the photos of the trip
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