BootsnAll Travel Network



Archive for the 'Ireland' Category

« Home

My Ireland trip – photos

Thursday, March 29th, 2007

I am only now getting around to posting up some photos of my trip to Ireland with Jane last summer.  Still…better than late than never methinks…

 

Mai, John, Jane & me (& Froggy the rubbish bin) 

frog.jpg

 

The “Titanic” was built here in the Belfast shipyard

titanic.jpg

 

Unionist murals…

queen.jpg

 

And Nationalist ones…

bobby.jpg

 

And some that just dont ike George Bush…

bush.jpg

Stress-free in Dublin (It’s official!!)

Sunday, September 24th, 2006

I should have been halfway to America by now. A few glorious days in the New York summer with my wonderful girlfriend Jane, and then off to rural Pennsylvania to live & work as a volunteer for a year. Instead, today sees me in drizzling downtown Dublin, with 1 half-hearted nights sleep in an airport behind me, and another looming ahead. As is basically always the case with these shenanigans, the whole bloody farce is my fault. In a misguided effort at saving money (which I may – barely – do), I booked my flight to New York from Dublin, via Heathrow. “Ah” people would say when they heard of this idea, “so you’ll be skipping the 1st leg and just getting on the plane at Heathrow.” Och, if it were only so simple. A remarkably silly airline rule forbids you from doing this. So I had to get a cheap flight to Dublin, fly back to Heathrow, and then get on the plane to JFK. All well in theory, and only adding 3 or 4 hours to my day. Then it dawned on me that there wouldn’t be enough time in Dublin to move my bags across. Thus I put back my flight and have a whole day in the capital of the emerald isle. At this point, I feel I must share with you a favourite joke of John, an Irish pal of mine: “Why is Ireland’s capital the biggest in the world?” “Because it keeps on Dublin and Dublin.”
I emerged from the airport bleary-eyed and reclothed in hastily grabbed winter clothes from my suitcase, a piece of pie in my hand. This will be the last piece of my mother’s food I will eat all year, so I enjoyed it accordingly, and made an appropriate amount of mess. Walking the streets of the city in search of a coffee/couch combo I spotted a sign advertising “free stress tests”. Investigating slightly closer, I realised that this was a Scientology thing. I’ve seen similar offers for stress tests in Brighton, but never really thought about taking one. To be frank, most of my knowledge of Scientology comes from South Park, which isn’t overly sympathtic to it. So I rang the bell and went in. A young, friendly Irish fella greeted me and I sat down. He brought out a strange looking red box with dials on the front. Two cords came out of the box and they were attached to 2 hollow metal cylinders, which he instructed me to hold. I asked him how the machine worked, and he explained that our minds are outside our brains and that pictures from our past kindof float on the outside of our bodies. When you summon up an image that causes you stress, there is a noticeable difference in the electric output coming out your body, as shown on the dial. So far, so odd. He asked me to think about people I knew, about my new job, my old job, my girlfriend, my family. I did so. We did this for maybe 2 minutes. Then he told me that I didn’t seem stressed at all. “Whatever you’re doing, keep on doing it.” He said. He didn’t once mention Scientology. He didn’t offer me leaflets or tell me I needed to invest lots of money in a self-help program. I sat and waited for him to try and proselytise me. He never did. I thanked him for his time and left.
And now it’s time to leave this internet cafe and explore Dublin a bit more. Maybe even shoot on over to the Guinness factory for a pint of the black stuff.

Peace,

Bucky.