Dublin, Ireland
June 11, 2006
My first day in Dublin, my first time in Europe. Thought I should head off to the city center and do the character searching for this city. I was quite tired from the long flight but the place soon lifted my spirits. I packed my camera, a bottle of water in the backpack and set-off. I was staying at the UCD (University College Dublin) Glunomenia student residence. Some of those gaelic names were quite hard to pronounce. Anyway, as I waited for the bus I faced the first problem in this foreign country. The only bus -schedules, maps or things of that nature that faithfully take you around on foot anywhere in the world, were here in Dublin, reduced to a small paper stuck onto a pole by the bus-stop. The only cool feature about that bus-schedule (or maybe the pole, not quite qure) is that the paper is glued to a rotating cylinder. What that meant to me was, while walking in the city every so often I should run to a bus-stop and read the rotating schedule. If that is not the bus I am looking for, run to the next pole and so on. What an inefficient algorithm. So, I asked this gentleman standing next to me, if there is a similar schedule inside the bus that I can carry with me. He paused for a minute and then very diligently walked me to the oh so familiar rotaing scheduling installed at our bus-stop. When three other people repeated this behavior I learned how the moon appears in this city. Anyway, after tendering exact change at the bus (1.75 euros) I got myself a fine seat at the upper berth. The big glass windows gives a beautiful view. Shortly after, I was infront of the historic O' Connell street. And lo and behold, the first thing I see is a street party of the spiritual sorts. A gospel choir has blocked the roads. The river Liffey runs through and through the city with beautiful bridges across. Each bridge has a different name. I walked around aimlessly. Handsome european couples donned the streets of O' Connell. On a first glimpse, the city was dirty and unfriendly. I was a little dejected for all my Irish dreams. But in my heart, I knew I was wrong.This is just the strangeness of the first day. After buying a small lunch I headed back home to work on the presentation for the conference and also to catch some sleep.
June 12, 2006
I woke up early today for the conference starts today. After a quick shower I walked towards the conference hall and I had no idea where that was located. After a couple of wrong turns I reached the destination. I looked at the tutorials in session and I looked at the beautiful day Irish day waiting for me. I turned back and headed back to dorm. This day of June the 12th I endow upon myself a day of pleaure, frolic and aimless rambling in a foreign land. So, I walked to the office for the dorm to see if I can get a map. Map they had none, but some good tips about how to plan my trip. So, there were couple of place that I wanted to go to. The Wicklow County to enjoy Irish countryside and to see the Glendalough monastry, NewGrange tomb dating back to 3000 BC, the Irish sea, castles etc. Since I had the whole day today I thought I should save the attractions in the city itself for later days and do the distant place today. However, there was a problem. While Wicklow is beautiful and very very far to the south of Dublin, the sea was significatly closer and to the north. There are some old castles enroute. Once again in life, just as Robert Frost, I had to pick one lane. I thought I will use the time to debate until the reach the train station. So, I got onto a bus and the kind bus driver explained to me how and where I may take a train from. After a short while, he dropped me very close to a train station. Meanwhile, I was still debating. I decided I'll ask the person at the ticket counter and this is what he said. "Sea is good, but Wicklow you are taking of big money, long time..." I decided, I'll buy a day ticket for the train and just ramble around after I come back from the sea. We shall see about Wicklow, maybe with friends-to-be later..
My first day in Dublin, my first time in Europe. Thought I should head off to the city center and do the character searching for this city. I was quite tired from the long flight but the place soon lifted my spirits. I packed my camera, a bottle of water in the backpack and set-off. I was staying at the UCD (University College Dublin) Glunomenia student residence. Some of those gaelic names were quite hard to pronounce. Anyway, as I waited for the bus I faced the first problem in this foreign country. The only bus -schedules, maps or things of that nature that faithfully take you around on foot anywhere in the world, were here in Dublin, reduced to a small paper stuck onto a pole by the bus-stop. The only cool feature about that bus-schedule (or maybe the pole, not quite qure) is that the paper is glued to a rotating cylinder. What that meant to me was, while walking in the city every so often I should run to a bus-stop and read the rotating schedule. If that is not the bus I am looking for, run to the next pole and so on. What an inefficient algorithm. So, I asked this gentleman standing next to me, if there is a similar schedule inside the bus that I can carry with me. He paused for a minute and then very diligently walked me to the oh so familiar rotaing scheduling installed at our bus-stop. When three other people repeated this behavior I learned how the moon appears in this city. Anyway, after tendering exact change at the bus (1.75 euros) I got myself a fine seat at the upper berth. The big glass windows gives a beautiful view. Shortly after, I was infront of the historic O' Connell street. And lo and behold, the first thing I see is a street party of the spiritual sorts. A gospel choir has blocked the roads. The river Liffey runs through and through the city with beautiful bridges across. Each bridge has a different name. I walked around aimlessly. Handsome european couples donned the streets of O' Connell. On a first glimpse, the city was dirty and unfriendly. I was a little dejected for all my Irish dreams. But in my heart, I knew I was wrong.This is just the strangeness of the first day. After buying a small lunch I headed back home to work on the presentation for the conference and also to catch some sleep.
June 12, 2006
I woke up early today for the conference starts today. After a quick shower I walked towards the conference hall and I had no idea where that was located. After a couple of wrong turns I reached the destination. I looked at the tutorials in session and I looked at the beautiful day Irish day waiting for me. I turned back and headed back to dorm. This day of June the 12th I endow upon myself a day of pleaure, frolic and aimless rambling in a foreign land. So, I walked to the office for the dorm to see if I can get a map. Map they had none, but some good tips about how to plan my trip. So, there were couple of place that I wanted to go to. The Wicklow County to enjoy Irish countryside and to see the Glendalough monastry, NewGrange tomb dating back to 3000 BC, the Irish sea, castles etc. Since I had the whole day today I thought I should save the attractions in the city itself for later days and do the distant place today. However, there was a problem. While Wicklow is beautiful and very very far to the south of Dublin, the sea was significatly closer and to the north. There are some old castles enroute. Once again in life, just as Robert Frost, I had to pick one lane. I thought I will use the time to debate until the reach the train station. So, I got onto a bus and the kind bus driver explained to me how and where I may take a train from. After a short while, he dropped me very close to a train station. Meanwhile, I was still debating. I decided I'll ask the person at the ticket counter and this is what he said. "Sea is good, but Wicklow you are taking of big money, long time..." I decided, I'll buy a day ticket for the train and just ramble around after I come back from the sea. We shall see about Wicklow, maybe with friends-to-be later..
posted by Amar @ 7:15 PM
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