The Buried Life #27: Spend St. Patty´s day in Dublin, Ireland.

I recently downloaded a tv show from MTV called the Buried Life, a documentary of four guys living their life to the fullest. More specifically, they made a list of 100 things to do before they die and each episode documents one of their listed items. Such things as partying at the Play Boy Mansion, telling a joke on late night television, playing basketball with Obama, etc. Before I had even heard of the show I had created a list of 100 things I wanted to do before I die. Granted, as I get older, I update the list. After returning from Ecuador, there were a couple changes, to say the least.

We left on Tuesday night after Don Quijote class and headed for the Girona Airport to fly our favorite airline, RyanAir. Little did we know that the Girona region had been having some electrical issues due to the snow, which they were still recovering from (please see blog post: "F words...France, Fromage and F**k"). Our flight was scheduled to leave around 8pm which would get us into Dublin around 10:30pm. And yet, the electricity went out...and not just a brown out, a flicker, oh no...a good 20 minutes without electricity. It gets better, our flight was scheduled to board in 30 minutes and we were first in line. Ryan fooled us again. The airplane had been diverted to the other bum-f**k-nowhere airport near Barcelona. Great. We had no airplane. So we waited...and we waited until a voice came over the loudspeaker one hour and a half hours later, "the flight to Dublin has been moved to gate 15." Thanks, Ryan. So we booked it from gate 3 to 15, literally at the complete opposite end of the airport. We were tripping small children (the parents always send them first because the average person takes pitty on them and let's them cut in line, and then, BAM...the parents, grandparents, cousins and dogwalkers "look" for their children and in doing so, cut the ENTIRE line). Anyway, tripping small children, pushing Spanish people (telling them duty free had free sangria), and sprinting to the opposite side of the airport. We finally started to board the airplane, as I was pushing this short little Spanish woman, who was yelling "Candy, cuidado." I should have told the lady that she should cuidado (caution) before I run her and her friend Candy over.

At 12:15 our flight lands in Dublin, Ireland, the second most religious holiday to the Catholics of Ireland (obviously, Easter is number one, St. Patty's day is number two, and Jesus' birthday is number three). I may or may not have a stamp in my passport for Dublin on March 17th. We arrived at our hotel, (about a 20 minute bus ride from the center of the city) and were greeted with big, fluffy beds and a niiiiice bathroom. You have no idea what a nice hotel room means to a college student studying abroad. We immediatley went to bed in preparation for, as Colleen calls it, the high holy day. However, it was a little difficult to sleep, we were more excited than the night before Christmas.

The alarm finally went off, we prepared our green and headed out. We immediately saw how big of a deal the high holy day was, O'Connell street wad completely blocked off and people were already drunk. We were so ready. We then headed towards the Guinness Factory to start our celebration. It was so surreal. We had discovered the Disneyland for the Irish. We ended our tour with our complimentary pint of Guinness at the very top of the factory, the Gravity Bar.

We were just in time to head to the parade after we finished our Guinnesses. We stopped to had our face panited with a shamrock from some thirsty art students. Then, the parade. It was complete insanity. Small children were standin on ladders. Ladders! The crowd was so deep, I couldn't believe it. We made our way over to the other side of the street where we were only three or four people back from the street. The parade was incredible and a highlight of the trip. It was Carnaval in Rio de Janiero, but Irish style.

I took wayyyy too many pictures, and I loved every part of the parade. After the parade we met up with one of Tracey´s friends from school at had lunch at a really great burger place. We then wandered along the streets of Dublin and found ourselves at a carnival . I don´t know if having a carnival on the drunkest holiday of the entire year was the best decision. But, Tracey and Mattie hopped on one of the rides...

We then decided that it was time to spend time with the natives at the local watering holes. We found a great bar that wasn´t packed, which was harder to find than you will even know.

We spent the night there drinking Heinekens, we had had enough of Guinness, and mixed drinks. The bar was great. We made some new friends, watched some river dancing and even had stools and a table. We called it a night because we had to wake up early the next morning for our countryside tour of Ireland.

To see all of the photos, check out the Flickr album: http://www.flickr.com/photos/chasecarrie/sets/72157623629612367/

We met the best dancer in all of Central-Eastern Europe. (in progress)

The highlight of my trip to Strasbourg, France was...you guessed it, meeting the best dancer in all of central eastern Europe.

BCA promotes peace and justice as part of their slogan and once a semester BCA sponsors a conference open to all BCA students studying in Europe as well as European students studying in various countries. It's an all-expenses paid trip and is probably the highlight of this semester. BCA paid for every single part of our travels, including the buses we took in Barcelona and the trains we took to get to Strasbourg. It was great!

On Friday morning we all met up at the bus station to catch our flight from Barcelona to bum-f**k-nowhere Germany. Apparentley, the closest airport to Strasbourg was Germany...another country checked off the list. We boarded the plane...a RyanAir flight, we were so lucky. Being the intelligent RyanAir travelers that we are, we stood at the gate before anyone else did and were the first people on the airplane, it was great!

We landed in at the Baden-Baden airport in Germany. Strasbourg, France and Baden-Baden, Germany are about a one hour drive apart from each other. And, apparently, the closest RyanAir airport to Strasbourg. We were met at the airport by a BCA Strasbourg student who was very nice. We rode the shuttle bus from the airport to the train station, where I at streusel. Deeeelicious. We hopped on the train and headed for Strasbourg.

We were finally in Strasbourg, at 3pm in the afternoon. It was a nice day, so instead of taking public transportation, we walked to our hotel; taking pictures and being toursts. We immediately dropped our stuff off, sat for fifteen minutes and then headed to our first conference of the weekend. There were about eight of us from Etown, so it was really great to see some faces that I knew.

We met the panelists, six men, who are probably the smartest people I have ever come in contact with. After two hours of them using the biggest words I have EVER heard in my entire life, we headed to the BCA office for dinner and wine. It was so great to have everything paid for, not to mention the free wine. We managed to smuggle an unopened bottle out and drank it in our hotel room that night.

The next morning started out with FREE breakfast and then conferences all morning. The topic was about Obama and his affect on the European Union. There were students from Germany, Poland (the best dancer in all of Central Eastern Europe) and Greece.

After the second day of conferences we headed out to explore a little bit of Strasbourg and stumbled upon a little carnival where we ate crepes and played a couple of the games. Dinner was provided by the hotel, which was interesting to say the least. We´re pretty sure there was this cabage thing, which we all thought was onions that looked delicious, when in reality was awful.

The european students were staying at a different hotel, so they walked over to our hotel and we head out for a night of drinks with the germans. Because we were such a large group, and there were literally three bars in all of Strasbourg, we split up. I stayed with some of the girls from Etown and we ended up at an Irish pub.

The following morning was rough to say the least. However, the Barcelona girls decided to start the morning off early and walk around Strasbourg. We walked over to Le Petit France, which was really great. The houses were so picturesque. We then decided that we needed some coffee if we were gonna make it through the day. And then we happened to stumble upon a super fancy cookie place. 8€ and 20 minutes later, I walked out of there with four cookies. Probably not my smartest money decision, but well worth it.

 

We had conferences all day and ate free lunch. It was great. The conference finally came to a close. It was a lot of learning about not only the United States and the European Union, but about being more green, and how we can take what we´ve learned from the conference and spread it.

All in all, it was a great weekend. Who wouldn´t love an all expenses paid vacation. I really need to find a job like this. We had a flight out early Monday morning back to Barcelona, on RyanAir. We were back in Barcelona before 2pm. It was great.

To see more of my photos, check out the Flickr album: http://www.flickr.com/photos/chasecarrie/sets/72157623753928372/

F words...France...Fromage...F**k.

As some may know, my beloved parents are visiting Europe this week...and god bless them, they decided to stop by Barcelona on their EuroTrip and spend a week with me.

I picked my parents up at the Barcelona airport on Friday morning and the festivities began. We picked up the car, turned on the GPS, which was a blessing, and headed towards my house to pick up my things for the weekend. As I have never been in a car in Barcelona, nor have I taken any taxis in Barcelona sober I couldn't give any directions. We arrived at my house, safe and sound, and introduce my parents to Resu, who greets them with two kisses...a custom in Spain that most Americans aren't aware of, i.e. my parents. My mom spoke English with Resu and Resu spoke Spanish with my mom. This should have been a sign for the weekend. My host mom understands three words in English, jellow (hello), jess (yes) and shank uw (thank you). And as you probably guessed my mom also knows three words in spanish como se dice (how do you say...), taco con queso (taco with cheese) and bambino (baby) but only in the male form; which confused Resu when my mom tried to tell Resu thank you for taking care of her male baby. A little bit of a surprise to Resu.

After Resu tried to get my parents drunk, we started our weekend trip to Aix-en-Provence to spend the weekend with some friends from St. Sebastian's. In 1998 and 2004, the prime of my years as we saw from the home movies, Les Petits Chanteurs came to California on a singing tour and stayed in our house for a couple days. So my parents wanted to go visit the people who stayed with us in Southern France. We made it to the Spanish/Franch border a-okay and eventually to Jacques and Helen's house. So far so good. We spent the night speaking Engl-rench (English and French) and eating Ratatouille and cheese. Check and check, eating ratatouille and cheese in France.

We began the next day heading to the city center of Aix-en-Provence for some sightseeing. We started off with some cathedrals/churches, number fourteen and fifteen. Yes, I have been inside fifteen cathedral/churches in the short two months in Europe. I consider myself a cathedral/church conosseiur of Europe.

We wandered through the streets of Aix passing through the open markets and taking in the sights. (Now for a little background information...for Christmas I gave my mom a Vera Bradley wallet that zipped around, trying to encourage her to close her wallet all the way to avoid pick-pocketing.) So while wandering around I had repeatedly zipped close my mom's purse, aka the treasure box for pick-pocketers. While walking down the street, I turn around and see a short, toothless French lady yelling in French, waving around a Vera Bradley wallet. And in a span of .5 seconds I think to myself, "that's a nice wallet, I got my mom one like that for Christmas this year. F**k, that IS my mom's wallet." Our new tooth fairy/French lady friend had seen the pick-pocketer snatch my mom's wallet and had grabbed it out of his hands. So all in all, we recovered the wallet and my mom dropped to her knees and said a Hail Mary...well maybe only the first part happed, but still.

After lunch we headed to San Victoire, a famous mountain close to Aix. We took our touristy pictures and hopped back in the car to Jacques and Helene's house for more delicious dinner.

Sunday morning we started off with 10:30am mass at the cathedral in Aix. There were 57 priests at the alter and mass was in French...saying I was lost was an understatement.

After lunch we headed to Arles, the city of Van Gough. And the minute we got out of the car it started snowing. So obviously we continued touring and down to the ampitheater where it started hailing. We should have known what the rest of the weekend had in store for us. We saw cathedral number sixteen and made the decision to head back to Aix and spent the night eating leftovers.

Monday started at 10am when we hopped in the car and headed back towards Barcelona...or so we thought. We made it three hours away from Aix, after batteling the snow and European drivers who don't know how to drive in the snow, and ended in Perpignan, France. Due to the three plows and salters that exist in all of France the roads were closed. Trucks were stopped for kilometers and kilometers. So we decided that it was literally impossible to get to Barcelona that night...after trying for four hours. And so we searched for a hotel in bum-f**k-nowhere France. We tried one hotel, but they were all booked and gave us an address of another hotel, just two kilometers away. Which took an hour to get there because the car got stuck not only once, but twice.

We finally got to the hotel, freezing cold and headed out for dinner because it was almost 7pm. It had taken three times longer and we hadn't even made it to Barcelona. So we searched the town for dinner. Literally nothing was open. It hadn't snowed in over 20 years and we were the lucky americans to witness the snow. And our restaurant of choice for the evening, the ONLY restaurant open, Indian. And I had curry chicken for the first time. It was delicious to say the least and I probably ate it in ten minutes, my mom can testify.

So we started off the following morning at 7am with big hopes of making it to Barcelona. So we made it seventeen kilometers outside of Perpignan and the roads were STILL CLOSED. So back to bum-f**k-nowhere France and look for a hotel room. Only after calling travelocity and having them book us a hotel in Northen Spain. But, that is a whole-nother story in itself.
We landed at a Kyraid Hotel, a chain in France. We booked a room, they had free wi-fi...and check-in wasn't for another four hours. Great. It was literally impossible to get back to Spain and now we are trapped in a hotel for the next four hours. The front desk was less than helpful and decide to turn the air conditioning on while we sat in the hotel for the remainder of the day. We finally made it into our room where we spent the next four hours doing Sudoku, watching the news in French and using the wi-fi.

Did I mention that it wad also mid-term week. I had missed my Monday class, a review session for my Tuesday mid-term, the mid-term itself, as well as the review session for another mid-term and it wad only Tuesday. We headed out for dinner, battleing the icey streets, and went to bed with full stomachs.

So we started out Wednesday morning at 8am and had our sights set on Barcelona. After battleing the one-lane-nothing-but-trucks traffic we made it to Barcelona by 11 am. We dropped the suitcases off at the hotel and headed to drop the car off.

(i was never so happy to see the border to Spain)

Five straight days with my parents...stranded in France and literally nothing to do. Womp womp womp.

My parents spent their only full day in Barcelona on a tourist bus and saw all ofthe major sites of the city. Unfortunately we did not make our Segway tour reservation. Next time...

To see all of the photos, check out the Flickr album: http://www.flickr.com/photos/chasecarrie/sets/72157623643464235/

What happens in the bungalow, stays in the bungalow.

Welcome to Portugal! Our day started out bright and early on the first train out of Barcelona to the airport at 5:30am...which was a little rough for some, to say the least. Let´s just say that boarding an airplane while still drunk from the night before, is the best way to be sure to sleep the entire plane ride. We landed in Lisboa (Lisbon) and headed straight for our bungalow.

Yes, bungalow. As we were a group of five it turned out to be a lot cheaper to get a little love shack, aka  bungalow, for the weekend.We were basically camping...we had a stove, a sink, knives, which made the trip even cheaper since we were able to cook our own food. The only downside about the beloved bungalow is that it was about a 20 minute bus ride outside of the city. So, we headed into the city to do a little sightseeing and pick up some pasta, olive oil, garlic and bread. We also found some cards, which was a godsend.We spent the night eating delicious food and eating card games.

We woke up birhgt and early on Saturday and decided to take a red bus tour of Lisboa. I have come to the conclusion, that although I hate being a tourist and sticking out as an American, a red bus tour, any type of bus tour for that matter, is the easiest, quickest and overall cheapest way to see a city. So, we paid our 20€ for our two day passes and hopped on the bus.

(bull fighting arena; in Portugal, it is illegal to kill a bull in the stadium)

(there was a slight breeze that day)

(this cathedral was built by some king of Portugal as a promise to his queen. the queen made her king promise that if she produced a heir to the thrown, he would build her a cathedral. personally, a cathedral would be the last thing i would have wanted my king to build me)

(from left to right: Samantha, Mattie, Tracey)

(the pepper monastary)

We got off the bus at the end of the route and decided to grab some pasteries, use the bathroom and walk around a little bit. We stumbled upon the ONLY horizontal elevator in all of Lisboa...it was so hard to believe that not only was it the only one, but that there was such a thing as a vertical elevator. We have pictures of the plaque to prove it. 

We rode the elevator up to the top and were able to see the entire city, as well as the river. The city had a crazy resemblance to Guayaquil, Ecuador.

Unfortunately, after waiting for over an hour to hop back on a red bus, a little smart car pulled up, from the bus company, to tell us that there won´t be any more buses for the rest of the day due to the weather. So we then started to wander. We stumbled upon the modern museum, or something like that. Among the artifacts inside, was a Dyson vaccuum from 1990. Now I feel old.

(inside the modern museum; famous during the 70s?)

During the only bus trip that we took that morning, we had marked off which places we wanted to actually get off the bus and go to. So, we tried to figure out the bus schedule and headed to the Pepper Monastary. Samantha´s host mom said that she should definitely go there, so we did. Cathedral/church/religious building #14, we found Vasco, a famous european explorer, and of course we took pictures. This was kinda/sort of a big deal.

Our next stop was getting across the river to the giant Jesus statue. After numerous buses, trams, asking people in broken portuguese/spanish we gave up. We were so beaten down that we needed a night of expensive dining at the Hard Rock Cafe, and we went to town. Margaritas were requited.

We called it a night, retreated to the bungalow and fell asleep well before 11pm. 

We started the next morning, bright and early again, and hopped on a red bus. We did the other route offered by the red bus and were able to see a lot of the city.

We drove by the milenium boardwalk...or something like that.

(the train station)

(the zoo)

Determined, we headed out to get to Jesus. The night before, we asked reception how to get to the Jesus. There were ZERO buses that go to the Jesus. Good to know. After one bus, one boat and another bus, we FINALLY made it to Jesus. The only problem was that it was pouring rain. We were running, jumping, shielding the rain, there was so way to get away from it.

(golden gate bridge, much?)

(finally, the Jesus; throughout the semester we have been on a da vinvi clue hunt, it all started out at the Sagrada Familia and has continued since then. #11)

(Lisa was upset about the rain)

It took us two days to make it to the Jesus and we were there for less than 20 minutes. Womp, womp, womp.

Our next stop was the aquarium...but not before we got some lunch. Being the rich college students that we are, we headed to McDonald´s and Burger King.

(Tracey won a free burger!)

To the aquarium we went. The Lisboa aquarium is the biggest aquarium in all of Europe. How could we miss out on this?

It was great! We got a big discount on our entrance tickets and there were not only fish, but penguins!

The aquarium is built around a giant fish tank that has sharks, fishes and other type of sea life found in the mediteranean.

The penguin room had 43 penguins and it even had a list of all of their names!

(Joe)

(we were all a little confused about Anastazio)

(please, no photos)

We cooked some delicious veggies and dipped some cheap bread in olive oil and balsamic vinegar and spent the night watching the olympics. Our flight left early Monday morning and we were back in Barcelona by noon.