from Pillar to Post: a traveller's guide to stuff: Baile Átha Cliath

I was welcomed to Ireland with open arms. They were my arms, waving in astonishment at the line of us still waiting for the bus to pick us up from the ferry terminal over an hour after we docked. It was about 7:30pm by the time the double decker bus decided to show up and in this time I had befriended a fellow Aussie traveller in the hope that there might be a vacancy at the hostel he was staying at. It was a Saturday night and I had once again neglected to book accommodation.
My first taste of Irishness actually came on the bus when I noticed tiny green confetti shamrocks scattered across the second level floor. Confetti is not something I would normally pay much attention to, but I thought the style of confetti in this case seemed quite fitting. We walked to the Aussie's hostel and within seconds we had discovered that I still had nowhere to sleep for that night. Good old hostels.com helped me out after putting a coin into the automated internet machine in the Busáras terminal, and it was not long before I was unknowingly walking through the city's party heart, Temple Bar, on my way to my new temporary bed. That evening I did not feel like partying though, in fact doing anything apart from sleeping after my 14-or-so hour excursion sounded quite adverse. So that's exactly what I did. Slept.
The next morning I had to again look for a place to stay as the hostel was full for that evening, so I asked an older gent who was staying in the bed next to mine. He made a few suggestions and then let me know that there really was not much to do around the city apart from drinking and visiting the Guinness storehouse. This same guy managed to unintentionally change the course of my travels for the next six weeks by casually mentioning a place that he had heard was supposed to be quite nice: a little village south of Dublin known as Glendalough. The seed had been planted and as I walked around reciting the name in my head so I would not forget it (I'm not exactly known for my great memory capacity) it didn't take long to find a new hostel, the Shining Hostel, this one a little cheaper than the previous.
The weather was strange that day. It was never warm, but it shifted a number of times between sunny clear skies, bucketing down and windy. The last two usually occurring simultaneously. Actually, what am I saying? That kind of weather is pretty much the norm out in these parts. And by "these parts," I mean the entire British Isles. Dublin is known in Irish Gaelic as Baile Átha Cliath, or just Átha Cliath (it sounds a little like a cross between or and the 'o' in stop, followed by clee-a), which refers to a fortress from back when Ireland was a bastion in medieval times. It was perhaps not too startling to find out that the city was built on and divided in two by the River Liffey. The major shopping focus is on the north side of the river with the wide O'Connell Street and pedestrianised Henry Street providing much spending opportunity and many a busking location. And there were quite a few great buskers about, including a fantastic guitarist/singer and his overexcited dog and a very talented puppeteer. O'Connell Street is also home to the city's famous landmark, the 120 metre tall Monument of Light, or 'The Spire', which is actually meant to be a massive knitting needle in dedication to the most unexpected export, the Aran sweater. Odd.
While on my way to the supermarket that afternoon, in a shopping centre on Henry Street, I came across an Israeli guy manning a small nuts stall who tried convincing me to work illegally with him selling nuts for commission. What a job. I could have even made a few euro extra by working in the beauty stall across the way straightening people's hair. Hmmm. Thanks but no thanks. He did however give me a discount on nuts and offer to practically give me a lifetime supply if he could keep my hat.
That afternoon I spent in the hostel speaking with a guy that took a little bit too much of an interest in me, if you know what I mean. Somehow we ended up eating icecream covered in banana, jam and nutella with a Swedish girl while sitting on the floor of the hostel's bathroom. Not too sure how that came about. But in the evening a big group of us (mainly Swedish) headed out to Temple Bar - which is actually an entertainment quarter as opposed to just one bar - for some Guinnesses (I guess that's the correct plural of Guinness? Not Guinnii?).

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