Cork
24 Sep
Saturday morning began with a sugar-free shower (aka a wet washcloth and some Dr. Bronners) as we began our trek to the bus station. We put a can of tuna and leftover cucumber on our 1/2 baguette for breakfast and hopped onto a bus to Cork. Cork is Ireland’s second biggest city on the south coast. We heard it would be a great place to visit, so we headed out of dirty old Dublin asap.
The bus was spotless and the seats were in perfect reclining condition. I tried not to sleep, but it was raining outside… and you know how I get. Anyway, I suppose it was jet lag. The bus ride was superior… smooth and relaxing. The best part of this trip so far has been the views of the countryside on the bus. Greens like i’ve never seen before. I mean, every green. Explosive greens… contrasting some castle ruins and bright black and white cows in the distance. Oooooooooooooooh. I love cows. My spirits were very much lifted after the previous evening which consisted of fighting back tears while cold and homesick under stiff smelly blankets.
We arrived in Cork in 4.5 hours.
The streets were lined with outdoor shops, music/guitar stores, and food markets. The people seemed laid back, the buildings smaller, and the landscape more hilly. Our hostel, Sheilas, was MAGNIFICENT. Clean, bright, huge, friendly, and helpful. Todos.
We roomed with two Americans and two Spanish girls. We met up with Kyle’s friend JoAnna who is working at a home for mentally disabled adults here in Cork. She took us, her German friend Johanna, and her visiting New York friend Lani back to her place. The house is weird, but cool… in a Christian sort of way. We got caught in the rain and had some weird dude taking pictures of us from under an umbrella across the street. JoAnna and girls fed us leftovers, pizza, and chocolate. (just what we needed) It was great to hear someone speak English and actually understand what the were saying!
The next morning Kyle and I had a nice bread/jam/tea breakfast and decided to go on a “let’s get lost and take pictures” stroll. We came across lots of beautiful views, the grocery store (we spent E12 on food for the next two days including a bottle of wine), and a rugby game! It was great, probably high school kids. The game is so strange, weird huddling bracing each other… then kinda football-like. The field was towards the top of a hill – tons of Irish folk screaming at the sidelines “GO ON! GO ON!!” The view of the clouds was totally magnificent, the sky was illuminated. We headed back to meet up with the girls. Kyle, Lani, and I checked out a photography exhibit it town. It was photos from the Red Cross archive. Most were shots documenting wars and such devastation. Some starving children, psychologically affected POWs, dead bystanders… etc. The power behind each photo was immense. I was totally wrapped up, even teary eyed at times. It’s so easy to forget about such horrible traumas, especially when they don’t happen to you.
We returned back to the hostel to feast. And when I say feast, i mean FEAST. Pasta with onions, mushrooms, and pesto sauce… plus some 41 cent fish sticks and half a baguette and half a bottle of red wine. DELICIOUS. Otherwise, we’ve been eating well. Kyle decided to pack an EXTRA bag of food… full of chips, macadamia nuts, granola bars, and tons of vitamins. My personal favorite meal has been the cheapest… a baguette with a chunk of sharp Dubliner Irish cheese. Mmmm.
I met up with some boys from France and Israel who got me interested in WOOFing. It basically consists of volunteering to work on an organic farm in exchange for food and housing. You typically work 4-5 days a week for 4-6 hours per day. You can call the farms a few days in advance and see if they have room to take you for a week or so. Its perfect for travelers like us, and we’ve been looking more into it.
Everything has been really expensive so we’re trying to find ways to cut corners (asking people to fill our water bottles instead of buying bottled water… etc.) So, Kyle and I decided to try to save some $ and post a sign on the hostel bulletin board to see if we could find a ride west (we didn’t really have a destination in mind). The next morning, we had a knock upon our door. Two English girls were leaving Cork the following day in their rental car and offered us a lift! Their names are Mandy and Sheona (show-nah) and they are the classiest girls we’ve met on this trip! Our road trip with them was my favorite of days thus far. Since then, they have returned home… but they offered to house us if we want to visit if we return to London!
What else. Ahhh… I found a brochure that said the Jameson whiskey factory was only a 30 minute bus ride from Cork. Kyle was more intent in finding this amazing chocolate shop… so I ventured on my own to tour and explore the old whiskey distillery. The buildings were renovated but lots of the original bricks and such remained. I didn’t realize the whiskey process was so long and detailed. At the end of the tour they offered a tasting to two volunteers… could I pass this up? Nope.
I tried three types of Irish whiskey (Jameson, of course, being my favorite) a black label Jack Daniels, and an aged Scotch. Needless to say, I stumbled to the bus…
and slept most of the ride home 🙂
A guy in a dark green old english suit and tie told me, in the pub one night, that the faeries woke him up whilst sleeping in a grove of trees. Then, suddenly, the faeries turned into police. Or maybe, he thought, they were warning him about the cops. You surely do meet some weird characters in Ireland, but they’re all harmless. Even the old man who tried to cop a feel from Sheona amidst our drunken debauchery.
I checked out the Cork Art Museum. The ‘bulbous’ roof we have been admiring in the last few days actually was the third floor of the modern art section. There was a modern art video piece that depicted a naked woman floating in some greenish water surrounded by hundreds of jellyfish. They were very sensually floating around, barely grazing her skin and caressing her hair. I really enjoyed many of the Cork artists from the early 1900s. Their main focus, in one exhibit, was to document the people, landscape, and customs of the Aran Islands and Connemara.
MRumianowski
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