Getting Serious About A Heritage Tour of Europe

I have a lot of different kinds of European ancestry, and I realized it would be a lot of fun to try to get to all the countries with which I can claim a connection. I had done Ireland, England, and Northern Ireland, and now Scotland was on the list. Nov 9-13 I didn't have classes (it was "reading week"), and after the 11th I had no commitments - that was when I had an exam in Economics of Less Developed Countries. On the morning of the 12th, I set out to Edinburgh, Scotland. Not only was I going to a new place on my own, but I was trying a new type of lodging arrangement - CouchSurfing. CS is a website where there is a community of people who look for/provide a place to sleep for other members. I joined and found a place to stay with an American student at University of Edinburgh. The system may sound a little sketchy, but is tremendously safe - and it was a great experience for me.

I landed in Edinburgh and immediately felt at home. The bus ride through town from the airport went by some very familiar feeling areas and dropped my off right in the center of the city. I got my bearings and headed for the Royal Mile, which is the main historical street/area in Edinburgh. I window-shopped the pubs to find a place for lunch and settled on the Mitre. Guess what I got. If you can't venture a guess as to what Scottish food I was excited to eat, you should get to know me better. Answer: Haggis. It came with neeps and tatties (mashed sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes) and a Scottish ale, and was delicious!

It was too late in the day - twilight was before 4 - to go to the Edinburgh Castle that day, so I walked down the Royal Mile towards Holyrood Palace and Arthur's Seat. There were loads of shops selling kilts, scarves, and shortbread - all of which I enjoy (except kilts). Once I started getting out of the centre of the purely tourist stretch, I saw a really cool building with relief sculpture covering a side wall. As it turns out, this is Scottish Parliament. Yes, Scotland has their own parliament even though they are a part of the United Kingdom. It gets to decide most domestic 'Scottish' issues, as I soon learned. After putting your bag through an x-ray and walking through a metal detector, anyone and everyone is welcome in the Scottish Parliament complex. There is a cafe, gift store, exhibition on Scottish influence in Canada, and the Parliament chambers. Interesting note: Even though it's only been around for 10 years, Scottish Parliament has its own whiskey blend and tartan, and they are ready to sell it to you! I was able to get my hands on a free admission to the chambers to listen to the live debate. That afternoon was dedicated to Question Time, where members asked things like, "What will we do so that people don't throw their fridges away in bogs?" and "Why do you still allow for the inhumane practice of branding semi-feral animals in Scotland?" Interesting, I know, but I'm a pretty nerdy guy when it comes to government. And semi-feral animals.

Across the street from Scottish Parliament is Holyrood Palace. This is where the British King/Queen resides when in Scotland. I snooped around to several minutes trying to figure out if there were tours or anything, but there apparently aren't. I looked at its strange facade of variously-affected-by-smog stained stones and then went towards my next engagement.

Edinburgh's highest point, Arthur's Seat, is in Holyrood Park, next to Holyrood Palace (coincidence?!?!?). It is very close to the city centre, not more than half an hour's walk, and has a great view of the city. I made my way for the path that went up to it and made friends with a student studying in York originally from Hong Kong and walked up with him. Eventually, it started drizzling and he got scared of melting in it, so he left. While only 250 m. high, Arthur's Seat was a work out to scale. There were nice paths all the way up, but I still had all my luggage (a duffel bag with my computer, blankets, and clothing) because I hadn't been able to meet up with my CS host yet. After a few sit-downs, I made it! It was a really wonderful panoramic view of the Firth of Forth (the bay-type thing near Edinburgh), Leith (the city on the Firth), and Edinburgh. The landscape there in Edinburgh was very spectacular. It wasn't quite as green as Ireland, but the vegetation had a warm feeling to it. There was also quite a bit of jagged, dark rock poking up through the vegetation and moss growing on it. Along with the grey skies, the landscape looked very picturesque - not like a pretty and happy picture, but an interesting and moving picture.

After I trekked down the Seat (harder than you might think with a heavy duffel), I walked back through the Royal Mile towards the University of Edinburgh to meet my host. I got to his apartment and settled down for the evening. My host, Gabriel, was a really great guy. I had a great time seeing Edinburgh and hanging out with him for 3 days. A little later in the night, Gabriel, his friend, and I went to a pretty fancy pub where they had friends working. Because of that we got a great deal on dinner and scotch. I settled down in my place for the night and got ready for the next day.

The Baltimore Without "The Wire"

At the beginning of the semester, I joined the Environmental Society. It is one of the smaller societies on campus, and as I learned, made up of mostly environmental science students and postgrads who research plant genetics. Every year, the club goes whale watching in Baltimore, Co. Cork. This ain't your regular Baltimore, MD; it's a small, peaceful town with only a few pubs. I went along on the weekend of Nov 7-8. This was my first (and only) trip with non-Americans. There were about 20 people, and included a majority of Irish students, sprinkled with Belgians, Germans, French, South Koreans, and Swiss.

The drive down to Baltimore took the better part of the day. After a 3 or so hour trip to Cork, it took another 3 hours to go about half the distance to Baltimore because of the small, winding roads. Once there and at our hostel (at which we were the only guests), we found out that the owner forgot we were coming and told us to climb in the window to find the spare key. Obviously, this wasn't a place riddled with crime.

A handful of us took a walk down the the cliffs that line the entrance to the Baltimore harbour. Here was a 'famous' white obelisk called the Beacon that tipped ships off to the whereabouts of the harbour entrance, apparently difficult to find otherwise. This was one of the southernmost points of the island of Ireland. The wind was unbelievably strong. So strong that most of my pictures are blurry. The whole area was apparently a cow pasture sometimes, based on the landmines that were strewn about. It was a beautiful place to watch the sunset.

The folks at Casey's Restaurant and Hotel (listed in the Michelin Guidebook!) were kind enough to host 20 rowdy college kids (their daughter is a TCD student, so they may have felt obligated). We had a wonderful dinner (that lasted about 3 and a half hours) and conversation there. I learned that Cork is partial to Murphy's Stout, the southwest's answer to Guinness (a mighty good answer too). I had seafood chowder with seafood from a few miles away and beef and Guinness stew, along with the loads of mash, veg, and leek custard that were piled on the table.

So, this trip to Cork was 2/3 funded by the Students Union (nice!). But as a condition of getting the money, we said that we would do some beach clean-up or something (they didn't think that whale watching and eco-tourism was a good enough reason to front the money). After walking around before dinner, we realized there were no beaches. So we talked to the owner about cleaning up in town or something and she was delighted to get some help! She offered us rubber gloves, trash bags and some dirty areas (which we found to be similar to the poor parts of The Hamptons). She was so excited that she wanted us to stay for a picture for the town newspaper. Once we had our way of not losing funding, we went to the other bar in town and hung out for a few hours.

The next morning was our trip to go whale watching. BAD NEWS. It was too violent at sea to go whale watching. What?!?! The reason we came to Cork is ruined?!? Well, Captain Nick could offer us a discounted trip through the harbour and up the river to look for seals, birds, and otters (officially the cutest animal ever). We took him up on it and saw some great scenery, a whole lot of birds, a few seals, and a log that Captain Nick thought was an otter. Our suspicion was that there were no otters there ever and he was using them as a way to keep our attention. Interesting sights included: a small island that was home to a single male goat (his donkey friends were transported to shore, but he was forgotten about), a seal sunning itself on a rock, and a castle or church covered head to toe in ivy.

After a pleasant boat ride, we went to clean the town like the noble environmentalists we are! But wait, there was no garbage in this town to speak of! Our haul was mostly bags of empty liquor bottles thrown in the woods, most likely by teenagers circumnavigating their parents and the drinking age. We still got our picture taken by Mrs. Casey though, and we were instantly village heroes!

Our quick trip to Cork was over then, and we started back for Dublin.

Wrapping Up London

Hey, it's only 23 days late, but I'm finally finishing up the blogging for my London trip. Now I only have to write about trips to County Cork, Edinburgh, and Copenhagen! Not to mention finish homework and report on the strike tomorrow. That's right, the union of public sector workers are striking tomorrow. That means all university staff and faculty, bus drivers (maybe?), and such will be off.

Sunday was a sad and rainy day in London. My trip was about over, and I would have to say goodbye to Jenna until late November. We had about half of the day to make use of, though, so we checked out of our hotel, stored our bags, and headed out. Jenna wanted to see Charing Cross because it is home to the Leaky Cauldron in Harry Potter. Once we made a stop on that street, we realized how close we were to the National Portrait Gallery, National Gallery, and Trafalgar Square. We then went to National Portrait Gallery, National Gallery, and Trafalgar Square. The Portrait Gallery was expensive, and we were unsure as to whether or not it was worth paying, so we just looked in the shop, because art museum stores always have fun stuff to play with. Next door was the National Gallery.

They didn't allow pictures, but there were several famous and fantastic works. There was The Ambassadors, which is a painting of 2 ambassadors posing with several objects they had brought back from their travels. When I applied to Northwestern, this painting was the subject of one of their essays, so it was really fun to see it in person. I never realized how deep of a painting it was; there were minute details that ended up being very important, like a broken string on a lute representing fragmentation of society during the Reformation. Also, there is a piece of 'driftwood' or something in the foreground, but when you move to the right of the painting, it shows itself to be a skull. Very interesting to see completely different objects based on what angle you look from.

Right outside of the National Gallery is Trafalgar Square. It was a little monotone because of the rain, and because the fountains had been turned off for the season. Nevertheless, it was an impressive sight. In the middle stands a huge monument to Nelson. There were lions the size of trailer homes at the base and a several-story high pillar with Nelson on the top. There used to be a Nelson monument in Dublin, but someone blew it up...

After we picked up our luggage from the easyHotel and took our last walk around Paddington, Jenna had to catch her bus to the airport. It was very sad to see her go. I moped around to where my bus would pick me up and stopped to have a last cask-conditioned ale in the pub next to the bus stop. I rode for an hour and a half to Stansted Airport and got herded onto my Ryanair flight to Dublin (moo!).

Here are some miscellaneous photos from along the way, of the hotel, the restaurant we ate at Saturday night, and the Tube.

A Big Auld Day!

With Saturday came Halloween. SPOOOOOOKY!

The day began with a trip to the famous Abbey Road to see where the Beatles actually did the recording and, more importantly, the album cover. We planned on taking the Tube there, but this weekend, they decided to close down most of the important lines of the Tube to 'perform maintenance.' So we took the shuttle buses, which didn't bother us because they were red double-deckers. The area around Abbey Road is not touristy at all. It is a very pleasant and livable area. We followed the directions I found online and found the crosswalk. There were a couple other small groups of people doing their poses like the album cover and writing messages on the gates outside of the studio. Jenna and I worked on getting a good photo of each other walking across several times, and finally managed to get one. I imagine the people who drive in that area are continually frustrated by people like us slowly walking across the road.

After seeing the Road called Abbey, Jenna and I made a trip to see exactly where Harry Potter and Ron Weasley entered into the wizardly world on their way to Hogwarts. That's right - we went to Platform 9 3/4 at Kings Cross Station. The station was under construction, so the 'platform' was set off out of the way, enough that they had a sign telling silly folks like us where to find it.

Jenna and I left Kings Cross knowing that we were only muggles. We made our way to the Tower of London. The Tube stop nearest the tower was closed, so we got to make a walk through the Square Mile - the business district. The coolest building ever is there, called the Gherkin. We thought about going up close, but we could tell (from our experience in trying to walk to the Eiffel Tower - it is right there!) it was a long haul to get to it. We got to the Tower, which is actually a complex of 20 or so buildings, and bought tickets for a Beefeater (Yeoman Warder) led tour and watched the Asian tourists flock to the Fish and Chips stands like kids to candy. The beefeaters are very jolly and have sinister senses of humour. Our guide was no different. He loved to take stabs at the French and Americans, in addition to scaring small children by using his finger to 'slit' his throat while talking in a creepy voice. He also loved mentioning how 3 queens were executed on the grounds (2 of them wives of Henry VIII). There was a fantastic amount of history in that complex. For hundreds of years the sovereigns lived there and kept their most important prisoners there (including those queens, a few princes, and Walter Raleigh). The main building in the central of the complex was the oldest standing building I have ever seen, dating to about 1050. Inside was an extensive exhibit on Henry VII. There were rooms full of his sporting equipment, armour, weapons, and heraldry. The Tower of London is also where the Crown Jewels are kept. They are stunning. The gems are nearly blinding. There is a tale that 6 ravens must be kept at the Tower at all times or the kingdom will collapse. Being there (mere yards from where princes mysteriously 'disappeared' and queens were killed) on Halloween at dusk was creepy enough, then the ravens flying around at the top of the building dating from 1050 made it more creepy.

Nearby was St Paul's Cathedral, which is Christopher Wren's architectural masterpiece. A masterpiece indeed. It was so large that you have to go hundreds of metres away to see the dome on top. It was brilliant. This was the place that is immortalized in the WWII photo of smoke from German bombs wafting over London.

UPDATE:

I forgot to mention the great restaurant we ate at. It was literally next door to the hotel. Frontline Restaurant, as it was called, is put together by a group of journalists who have a mission that puts them somewhere between Amnesty International and Journalists without Borders. They own a farm that provides produce for the restaurant, and they try to get the other food from local and organic sources. I had a wonderful wild hare pie and Jenna had beef with hashbrowns. The dessert was probably the best part (duh), chocolate almond cake and lemon tart (for Jenna).

London was full of great sustainable food. There were several grocery store chains that highlighted free range, British (which means local for such a small island), organic, and fair trade. There was a coffee shop called Pret a Manger on every other corner that boasted no artificial anythings, real food, freshly made, and lots of instances of sustainable ingredients. There are Prets in New York (I hear) and I saw some in Edinburgh and Glasgow too.

The Day That Began With The Changing of the Guard

I heard from many different people that I HAD to go to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace while I was in London. It is a very quintessential thing to do while visiting the city because it encompasses everything England is supposed to be - full of strangely dressed guards, obsessed with monarchy, and full of pomp & circumstance.

Apparently, everybody else visiting London on this Friday morning also was going to see the changing of the guard. It was a very busy place. Jenna and I had been distracted from the palace (we were early) by the fun waiting in Green Park - this time it was lit up by the earth's big light bulb (the sun) instead of that one creepy street lamp. The leaves were colourful and were lining the ground, the weather was great, and there was a cool fountain. It had something to do with Canada - either as a gift to it or from it. Then, we heard clop-clopping coming from the road and we saw a large group of horses coming down the road with redcoated guards riding them. They circled the area and then left inexplicably. Their arrival did signal us to the fact that we should find a spot to stand to watch the real thing start happenin'. Before they did, Jenna and I played a fun game called "Based on what kind of car this person has, how important are they?" where we ranked the people going through the gates into Buckingham

Soon a marching band came into the area, and eventually entered the courtyard of the palace. After marching around a little bit more, a few musicians broke off into an ensemble to play classic songs like "Eleanor Rigby." As for the actual changing of the guards, there was ceremonial marching and one guard left as another came. There wasn't a whole lot more to it. It was simple, yet elegant.

I was advised to eat lunch at Harrod's, and to see the store in general. I had heard the food hall was a maze of glass cases full of the world's finest epicurean delights. How could I not go?!? When we got off the Tube on the very fancy Brompton Street, Jenna and I saw a massive red stone building with Christmas windows that make the weak faint and the pocketbook cringe. Inside, the phenomenon was even more pronounced, between the designer labels and the red marble and gold decoration. Jenna and I headed to the Christmas/Harrod's gift portion of the store and found some cool presents and candies. We then went to the food hall, which was everything I thought it could be. They even had an Iberian Ham bar! That's right, my dream of eating delicious razor thin slices of ham just sliced from the pig leg mounted behind the counter (with the hoof proudly displayed, as to show how good of a pig it actually was) came true. I had a feast on a little bit of the ham, then Jenna and I poked our noses around to find something more substantial. We ended up with pea and bacon soup to share, I got a pastrami ciabatta sandwich, and she got a ham croissant. Deelicious! We, the little children that we are, found the actual Christmas floor and looked at the shiny trees, lights, and ornaments. Shiny!

Our afternoon activity was a ride on the London Eye - a massive ferris wheel on the banks of the Thames. After waiting in line to pick up our reserved tickets, and waiting in line to have our tickets approved, then waiting in line to get into our pod of the ferris wheel, we finally got on the Eye. There were about 12 other people in the same pod as Jenna and I, including a few rabidly wild children who were far too close to opening the door and falling many stories to their death. There were also some inattentive parents on board. The vistas from the Eye were eye-catching. It really gave you an idea of how big London is, and how everything is laid out in relation to other things, much better than the Tube stops can.

That night, Jenna and I went to explore Oxford Road, which is one of the main shopping roads. I ended up buying a shirt on sale, and some shoes. I had wanted similar shoes from the same store in Dublin, but wouldn't buy them because they were so expensive. BUT because the pound is a lot weaker now than it was, it was much cheaper to buy them in London! We also looked for a piece of street art that was supposed to be in the area by the most famous street artist in the world, Banksy. We didn't find it, which was disappointing, but it was an adventure. After that, Jenna and I went back to the easyHotel and watched more British tele, which is SO much better than American TV.

London Part 2

It seems like when Jenna and I go on trips together, we then blog about the in rather similar manners. She usually puts up a post about each day before I post about the same day, but don't let that fool you! I am not simply rewriting what I read on her blog. I swear.

At easyHotel, they like to charge for wifi. Neither Jenna nor I like to pay for wifi, so we found free wifi at Costa Coffee - one of the 4 coffee shops that line each and every street in London. They also had breakfast for us! We figured out what we needed to figure out and went on our merry way to see really amazing things. Our first stop was the British Museum.

Here's the prologue for the British Museum: At one time, the British (specifically the English, because the Scottish were brutes, the Irish hated them and were brutes, and no body cared about the Welsh and their overuse of y's and l's), did whatever they wanted to whomever they wanted. They said to the world, "Jump!" and before the world could say, "How high?" the British asked their armies to throw them in the air instead. After a while of doing this, the British decided they were going to take whatever they thought was cool and put it all in one building in London where all Britons could admire it. That building is the British Museum.

The British Museum is massive. Housed in a neo-classical building (slash set of buildings?) near University College London, there are galleries devoted to Egypt, Greece, Rome, Iran, Babylon, the Aztec Empire, and Mexico. Oh yea, and Native Americans and Inuit. And probably more. As soon as we walked into the first gallery, there was a massive slab of stone - the Rosetta Stone! It was a very impressive thing to see. Without that, we would have no clue how to decipher hieroglyphics. Most people know that much about it (and that it is the name of a language acquisition program used by the State Department and UN!), but who knows what it actually says? I did not, but it turns out that one of the Ptolemys made a deal with the Egyptian priests, wherein the priests could keep on keepin' on and Ptolemy could start his own cult. "Cult" is the word used on the description tag, not my own biased addition.

We soon saw large sculptures of pharaohs, Egyptian gods, and other Egyptian things.

The next section was Greece. There were rooms of ornate sculptures, including a room devoted to Alexander the Great. Being a namesake, I felt honored. As you can see, I posed for a photo with him. It is called Alexander and Alexandre, Both Great. Also in this section is most of the decoration from the Parthenon! Thomas Bruce, Earl of Elgin (not Illinois), was in the area and noticed how poorly the Greeks treated the Parthenon, so he essentially said, "Children, if you can't play nicely with your ancient runes, I will take them away." And he did. There is an enormous room full of the sculpture that covered the top of the Parthenon, and it's amazing.

There was a whole exhibit on watches and clocks. There were pocket watches spanning the last 500 years and all sorts of mechanical clocks. One of these clocks used a small metal ball rolling back and forth as a second hand (very cool idea), but it wasn't very accurate.

One of the more enjoyable things I saw was a temporary exhibit on the cartoons, posters, and prints of Revolutionary Mexico. The "Revolutionary Mexico" that was being shown was mostly from around 1900-1920, as opposed to all of the other times Mexico had revolutions. These were great! I very much enjoyed the thick black lines of the woodcuts and the witty cartoons.

I ended up getting a couple souvenirs for myself there - a Rosetta Stone metal water bottle (so I can brush up on my Greek while hydrating myself) and a London Street Art book (because how could I not?!?).

Jenna and I hopped on the Tube and went to our next destination - Covent Garden. It used to be a fruit and veg market, but is now a shopping, eating, and entertaining arcade. There were entertaining street performers as well. From there, we went to Piccadilly Circus.

"The Times Square of London!" I had heard it called. Whoever said that had it pretty close. There were millions of people, bright signs the size of the Vatican, and advertisements for musicals everywhere. There's also a large statue of Eros, but I have no good photos to show for it. After walking around the circus and browsing souvenir stores for a while, I was huuuuungry. Jenna and I had picked out an Indian restaurant in the area that got good reviews, and we scurried out to find it. The food was delicious (I had garlic naan and lamb curry, Jenna had chicken tikka masala and naan, and we split veg curry). Once back at the easyHotel, we watched British TV. There was a show about the most famous English chef Heston Blumenthal trying to turn Little Chef back into a reputable roadside restaurant that was a fun watch. Maybe it's made its way onto BBC America and you have seen it already.

London Calling

The morning of October 28th will live in infamy for a long time to come. Why? I had to wake up at an incredibly ungodly hour. I don't quite remember when it was (since it was almost 2 weeks ago) but I'm guessing 4:30. If anything, I should be coming home at that hour. I was happy to do it though, because I was going to meet Jenna in London for 5 days!

I was flying Ryanair for the first time this trip, and I wasn't quite sure what to expect. I had read article after article on bOINGbOING about what a shitty, miserable airline it was, but I am not the sort of guy to need anything from a flight besides a seat and a safe landing. Once I got on the plane (after jumping in line quickly to make sure I got a good seat - there are no assignments, and I didn't pay extra to go in the fast line), I realized I was on a flying flea market. From the instant the stewardess said, "This is a smoke-free flight," they were trying to sell things to me. Smokeless cigarettes, lottery tickets, pizza and burgers, beer, you name it. But whatever. I slept through it and CEO Michael O'Leary didn't even try to charge me for it. I flew into Luton, which is a "quaint" airport for cheap airlines about 50 km north of London. Jenna and I got on a bus and went to foggy London town. I was actually in London!

The hotel we stayed at was the off-shoot of EasyJet, the British version of Ryanair. Easy[hotel, bus, jet] loves the color orange. Everything was orange there. We had a great location about 2 blocks from Paddington Station, near a hospital, halal markets, restaurants, and chip shops. From Paddington, we could get nearly anywhere on the Tube (subway) very easily. Sometimes - 2 of the lines were closed all weekend, but luckily we didn't need them anyway. It was a hefty one time price, but we got week passes for the Tube. In the end, it saved us a lot of money and our feet a lot of unnecessary walking. By the way, I am fascinated with the Tube. The graphic design is very appealing, from the maps to the logos and the commissioned art in some stations.

First stop was the Westminster stop. This is where Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament that Big Ben is attached to, are Westminster Abbey are. I walked out of the Tube thinking, "Now it says Big Ben is right around he... Oh!" It was right there in front of me. I was standing at the base. It may be just a big clock, but it is a damn cool big clock right next to a damn cool building where many of the most important people in history spent a lot of time. It was a great spectacle. Since this is where the British government operates, this is where people come to express their opinions on policy issues, you know, like how the Freemasons are killing dozens of innocents. Wait, what?!? Yes, there were a few protesters across the streets demanding action in the deaths of several people at the hands of the ever-implicated Freemasons.

Also a great spectacle, although an expensive one, was Westminster Abbey. That's why they can charge a lot for it, thought! Inside, there was so much to see. There were chapels and shrines and tombs practically stacked on each other. There were several Kings buried around the place from far before my lifetime (to say the least). Admission comes with a really good (and for no additional cost) audio guide, which helped make up for my lack of knowledge of English history or anything Anglican. I didn't need any additional help to figure out that seeing the tomb of Elizabeth I was pretty damn sweet, nor that the Poets' Corner encapsulated a lot of the best writing ever (with shrines to Jane Austen, Shakespeare, Dickens, and more).

Jenna and I were in the Abbey at dusk, so there was a spooky, dark hue to the whole place. The spooky ambiance was helped along by the choir at Evensong. We sat down in the service for a few minutes, and soon proceeded to leave. There are no pictures allowed in the Abbey, so here are the pics from outside or snagged from the 'net.

After looking at how mesmerizing things look when they are colorfully lit up at night, Jenna and I went over to Buckingham Palace (coincidentally, another mesmerizing things colorfully lit up). We had to walk through Green Park to get there from the Tube, which strangely, has only 1 dim light in the whole park. It contributed to the now recurring theme of spookiness. As we approached Buckingham, I realized why there were so few lights in the park - the government blew the lighting budget on the 2 huge walls of lights focused on the Palace. They even rotated between blue, white, and red! It was an impressive thing to see, but there's not much to do there at night. Jenna and I would be back on Friday to see silly men in moleskin hats march around.

Back in our neighborhood, we found a reasonably-priced joint to fill our stomaches called Garfunkels. It was tasty stuff - sit-down restaurant type burgers, pizzas, and English food.

Oh Yeah, and Other Stuff

I was in London for the past 5 days (Wednesday to Sunday). It was exciting. There were impossible to find Banksy pieces and the ravens weren't there just for Halloween. Cliffhanger alert, this post is not about London, just a couple of things that I had forgotten to put in before.

A while (too long) ago I went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA). It is a fairly small museum, because who's really heard of Irish modern art? Well, you might not have heard of it, but if you go to Wash U, you know. That's right, there's a surprise discovery in store for me and my fellow WUers at IMMA.

IMMA is in an area called Kilmainham, which is where the Kilmainham Gaol (that's Jail in English) is located, and not that far from the Guinness Storehouse. It's housed in the 300+ year old Royal Hospital, a home for veterans of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the pre-independence era. It was under renovation when I was there, so the main entrance was closed (which almost foiled me finding the coolest thing there) and it seemed like a fair amount of the museum's space was closed too. Nonetheless, there were a few impressive exhibits. One was full of pieces by artists reinterpreting their works that were already in the museum, which was impressive for its use of multimedia (except some of the originals weren't in the open parts of the museum). My favorite piece was in the regular gallery and was called "Above All Else." I had seen the name placard for it, but there was no corresponding artwork. The sly guy in my thought, "Wait. Above all else." I looked up and there it was!

I like textual art, and the clever little taglines that come with it, so this piece was right down my alley. I sat down and read about the artist and piece in IMMA's "curbside" study room and learned that this same artist, Douglas Gordon, directed a documentary about Zidane (the footballer who headbutted his Italian oppenent in the 2006 World Cup). I wasn't supposed to take this picture (that's why it's kind of tilted and abruptly taken) because of a no photography citing some shit about copyright.

That's something I don't understand about museums in Ireland and the UK. "Copyright" prevents visitors from taking photos. At first glance, this might seem like a legitimate concern. The artists of these works put a lot of effort and heart into creating them, why would you let people waltz right in and take pictures that could reproduce the work? Well, there are two things wrong about that argument. Number 1: I'll go out on a limb and say no way an amateur with a point-and-shoot (and probably not a fancy camera either) camera will be able to get a shot good enough to be a legitimate threat to the original piece. That's why there are 1 gazillion DPI resolution scanners and gift shops. Number 2, and this is where the crux of my frustration comes from: Taking a picture of a little art installation or painting falls under Fair Use. It is a non-commercial use (because my camera is sure as hell not going to produce anything worth selling), and for many it's educational use, whether for class or cultural education. Both of those characteristics make it legal to copy the artwork onto your camera. Oh yea, and copyrights usually expire 70 years after the artist is dead, so that doesn't help the museums either.

Now that you've scrolled by my rant, the awesomest part. You know at Wash U there is that ugly-ass bunny in the Thinker pose, and that you love it even though it's kind of hard to look at?

Well, when I walked around to see what was near the front entrance of the IMMA, I saw something that struck my eye as familiar.

I asked around and did some interwebs research, and just as I suspected, these are done by the same artist, Barry Flanagan. There actually used to be a copy of the Thinking Rabbit on O'Connell St in central Dublin. I came 5,000 miles to Dublin, and can't get away from the weird-ass rabbits that are in St Louis, I mean that in a good way though.

Also, I found a really depressing article in the Irish Times about how bad Ireland's economy is right now, especially for recent University graduates. Since it came out Monday, I've gotten 2 emails from my program directors with links and reaction to it and my Irish Politics lecturer has talked about it. But I found it first.

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Alex Christensen Oh, good to know - now that I'm stuck here for a month and a half more.

'Ireland is a disaster . . . leave now and enjoy your life' - The Irish Times - Mon, Nov 02, 2009

Source: www.irishtimes.com

On these pages last week, Shane Fitzgerald, a young graduate of University College Dublin, wrote about the Government’s failure to deliver on its promise of a bright future in Ireland for him and his generation. ...

Tue at 7:18pm · Comment · Like · Share

See? I'm on top of things. But more importantly, Ireland might be slipping back into the cycle of emigration that characterized it for 140 years. There is a horrible worldwide recession, but the Irish government and society are making it worse than it needs to be. In my opinion, and remember that I'm an amateur economist, this is not the time to be be parsimonious in public spending. Already 12%+ of the workforce is unemployed, and if social welfare can't hold them up for the next little bit, there is going to be a horrible loss of confidence and human capital in the country. And that's for the ones who don't leave.

Remember in the US last year when there was a bailout enacted very quickly to counteract the disastrous effects of frozen credit markets? Ireland hasn't done so yet, and their meltdown started before the US's. There is a widespread sentiment that the banks (like AIB) should be left to bleed, and afterwards the country can start clean. That may be true, but if Ireland wants to be able to hold the scalp of AIB in its hands as a warning to banks in the future, they will be doing so instead of working, on a block of deserted buildings. Without the credit that makes capital expansion possible, there will be no recovery in Ireland. All of the critics of the "degradation" of traditional Irish culture during the Celtic Tiger will get to revisit traditional Irish culture, this time without the rose-colored glasses. They will be poor, isolated, and begging the EU for cash because of the Government's unwillingness to step up and establish the National Asset Management Agency.