Dublin and That F&#$%#$ Molly Malone

... and for your information, F&#$%#$ translates into fishing. What else did you think it meant?

Although, I must say that if I heard one more thing about f&#$%#$ Molly Malone, I was about to throw a frozen stick of butter at whoever said it. For those of you who don't know who Molly Malone is, join the club. I'll address that later.


Laurie and I arrived in Dublin far too early and without much coffee in our systems. But the fun doesn't wait for you to drink a latte. As soon as we boarded the bus to the hotel, the monuments started coming. First on our list? The Ryan Air global headquarters. If you know anything about me, it's that I love Ryan Air. I love Ryan Air so so so so so much. I love how they try to convince me to buy smokeless cigarettes while I'm trying to nap. I love how they pretend like the in-flight soda services is free but it's totally not. I love how the pilots can't seem to land a plane for the life of them, even though they are the flipping pilot! One thing I do genuinely like about Ryan Air, however, is the fact that they sell lottery scratchcards to benefit children in need. Think of the children!

Okay, RyanAir aside... we got to our hotel (The Anchor House B&B... our room was colossal) about five hours too early for check-in, so we naturally decided to go check out Dublin. Cut to a bus tour of the city, which we had to do again the next day because Laurie and I couldn't stay awake for the first go. That, folks, marks the first mention of Molly Malone, who happens to exist only in an Irish folk song:

In Dublin's fair city,

Where the girls are so pretty

I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone,

As she wheeled her wheel-barrow

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh!"

Molly Malone herself... if you ask me, she should be selling melons, not seafood.

Picture courtesy of LittleShamrocks.

The Molly Malone statue is one of the most famous landmarks in Dublin, and the official meeting point for all day tour bus trips. This chick is seriously packing. She needs to put down her wheel barrow and strap those babies back! No wonder she had a song written about her. By the end of our four-day stay in Dublin, I'd had quite enough of old Molly girl, although I highly appreciate how the Dubliners affectionately refer to her as "the tart with the cart." I hope to be thought of so fondly someday (but, let's face it, I don't have Molly's ample assets, and therefore would probably not be folk song worthy).

Other great landmarks in Dublin include the Millennium Spire on O'Connell Street, which is this huge spike thing that's something like 400 feet tall and looks like something Vlad the Impaler would lust after. Then there's a  bunch of statues dedicated to a bunch of people in the Easter Uprising, which all the tour guides mentioned but never really explained. I should probably catch up on my Irish history.

The food in Dublin is also quite good... I tried cabbage and bacon, fish and chips, some kind of stew, several Irish breakfasts. The Irish breakfast is seriously good: toast, fried eggs, bacon, sausage, black pudding, white pudding, and baked beans. It's almost as good as a Scottish breakfast, which is virtually the same thing but a bit smaller and more manageable to fit into one's stomach. So yummy. And while I'm sure the beer was equally as fantastic as the beer in London, I spent most of my time in Ireland drinking ginger ale after catching  a bit of a bug somewhere between the two countries.

On the third day, we went on a day trip into the west to the Cliffs of Moher, which are these beautiful cliffs in County Clare that have been named a UNESCO heritage site. There is cliff after cliff after cliff, all plunging into the Atlantic Ocean. On the day we were there, it was cloudy and misty (I have never seen such low clouds), which only upped the majestic character of the cliffs. There was even a crumbling, stone lighthouse. I felt like I was standing in the beginning paragraph of a gothic novel:

The clouds were low that day, ever so low. Along the ragged coastline, the rock edge plunged into the sea, which growled against the nipping wind. Freezing rain battered my skin and coat as I made my way toward the only light source in the night, the stone lighthouse perched so precariously on the cliff's edge. Somewhere in the distance, a thin vein of light illuminated the sky, followed by a violent crack that reverberated in the very ground beneath my feet. My breath caught in my throat, the freezing air paralyzed my lungs, only to force puffs of slivery-blue clouds as the cold seeped into my very bones. It was the sort of place that would never leave me, that would always bring about a cold ache in my bones when i thought of it. I didn't know it then, or maybe I did. Who knows. Who knows anything anymore?


Better yet, I later learned (even though i had a sneaking suspicion during the tour) that the cliffs were where a bit of the Princess Bride was filmed (No more rhymes now, I mean it! Anybody want a peanut?)

We spent our fourth and final day lounging about Dublin, taking a few jaunts, starting with St. Patrick's Cathedral and finishing with the Jameson's Distillery (a natural progression, considering the "organ fund" at St. Patrick's was housed in a beer keg).

The inside of St. Patrick's

This actually isn't St. Patrick's... it's Christ's Church, but it looks pretty damn cool regardless.

And so our last night in Dublin came to a close, but not without seeing Rock of Ages for the second time. Yes, I know. If you are anything like my mother, who I love very dearly, you will be saying, "Well, if you love Ireland so much, why in the world did you see the same movie twice in four days?!"

To which I shall reply, traveling is tiring. It's hard. It's exhausting.

But it is so, so totally worth it.

Most of the time, I take in the sights--I run around town at a furious pace, trying to get my little eyes on everything I can find.

But sometimes--sometimes you just need to take in a movie.

My London London Bridge...

... wanna go down like London London London, wanna go down like London London London...

Does anyone even remember that song? Back when Fergie put out hits and didn't look like a tranny (not to mention that super bowl disaster in 2011)? Just kidding, I still think she's beautiful. Any woman who can get Josh Duhamel to put a ring on it is fine by me. 

The point of that totally pointless intro is that, about a month ago, I got to see London Bridge (the real one, not Fergie's, thank goodness) while I was traipsing around the UK on a seven day adventure. 

On June somethingoranother, I flew from Bologna to London Stansted airport, where my London hi-jinxes began. After arriving over an hour late (thanks, Ryan Air) and standing in the passport control line for over 45 minutes, I barely made my EasyBus to downtown London. Like, got onto the bus with less than two minutes until my ticket expired. Talk about skills!

An hour later, I valiantly attempted to navigate the London metro tubey thingy (which is expensive and has about about a million stops) on an empty stomach and caffeine deprived system. Needless to say, I couldn't stop giggling whenever I saw the stop named Cockfosters, which warranted more than a few dodgy side glances from passerbys. After a few wrong turns and misdirection, I finally made it to the Bridge Hotel (which I highly recommend!) on Borough Street, where I met up with the lovely Laurie Shepardson, my aunt and confidant who agreed to meet me in London when I had no one else to go with. She rocks, right?!

By the time we began wandering, it was nearly late afternoon. Naturally, instead of seeing the incredible sights that London has to offer, we opted to get a plate of nachos and two pints at a local pub, which I suppose could be considered a cultural excursion on its own. After catching up for a few hours, we waddled our way down to the Thames and ran into the best street performers I have ever seen. They were doing crazy acrobatics and stunts. It was incredible!

Big Ben!

The London Eye

We spent the remaining hours of sunlight snapping pictures on the Thames, stumbling into St. James park, wandering into painfully touristy tourist shops, and eating fish and chips (because, really, what else are you going to eat for your dinner in London?). Here is a snippet of the conversation Laurie and I shared:

Laurie: I think I'm choking on a bone.

Me: Are you all right?

Laurie: I'm choking on a bone!

Me: So you're not all right?

As you can clearly see, when I am tired, exhausted, and sucking down a pint of Becks, my deduction skills go straight out the window.  Like doves in the sky... oh, there they go... fly fly fly.

The next day we enjoyed a fabulous breakfast at the Bridge Hotel, complete with scrambled eggs made by the nicest Persian man I've ever met. After a quick coffee stop, we made our merry little way to Westminster Abbey, where we enjoyed a 2-hour audio tour voice by Jeremy Irons. It was fantastic! While Westminster strikes me as being slightly cluttered (lots of people wanted to be buried there, apparently), it was incredibly cool, especially considering that it was where Willy and No-More-Waitey-Katie got married last year (which I unabashedly admit to waking up at 4 AM to watch). It also has one of the best gift shops I've ever seen. Important issues, people!

Gothic architecture!

Westminster

The most fabulous gift shop ever!

After enjoying a fantastic bus tour, Laurie and I disembarked at the Tower of London and enjoyed a guided tour of the complex by a real, live Beefeater. 

Despite the ridiculous entrance fee of nearly 20 pounds, the Tower of London is seriously cool. It's a beautiful complex, absolutely overflowing with macabre history (my favorite kind!) and interactive biographies of the Tower's victims. There was one story in particular about two little princes who were killed there in the late 1400s; their bodies were found in the 1980s, having been buried beneath one of the staircases. Terribly sad stories, but incredibly fascinating. 

I was particularly moved by the chapel, where you can see the burial marker of Anne Boleyn, one of my top five favorite women in history. You might even say I was moved by it, or at least I would have been if I had more than 10 seconds to process the epic-ness of it all.  Instead I was scuttled off by a Beefeater with an unusually thick neck.

The Tower of London is also the location of the Crown Jewels of England, which are incredible. Although I still believe that everything on display is a highly convincing copy (are you really going to put the world's largest cut diamond on display for tourists? Have you seen episode 2x3, "The Reichenbach Fall," of Sherlock?), the displays were very well done. I exited the building feeling like a pauper, with dilated pupils and a racing heartbeat--so many shiny, glittering, sparkly things! Although I do have one admission to make: the entire time I couldn't help but think how much fun it'd be to let a raccoon run rampant all up in there. 

part of the the dreaded Tower of London complex!

We spent the rest of the day eating delicious, chewy candies as we rode a double deck bus around town. Then we walked down the incredibly busy, ridiculously ridiculous Oxford Street. The night finished with another plate of nachos, another couple pints of beer, and many complaints about hurting feet.

Our third and final day in London was spent sort of wandering about aimlessly and hitting up any sights we hadn't gotten to the previous two days. Naturally this included Buckingham Palace (only from the outside, since Queeny was in town for some sort of parade and, quite frankly, I've heard the palace isn't really all that great) and, much more importantly, the Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221B Baker Street (which, fun fact, never actually existed back in Conan Doyle's days). Throw in Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus, and a  few McDonald's stops, and I say we had a pretty awesome day!

The next morning we were up at something like 4 AM, checking out of the lovely Bridge Hotel and heading to Stansted airport to fly to Dublin. Our time in London had come to an end, sad beans! It might just be my favorite city that I've seen so far, or at least it's up there with Paris and Rome. I highly, highly recommend it. Another fantastic adventure!

Stay tuned for UK Adventures, Part II: Dublin!

I've very proud of this picture.

Time to Say Goodbye

... not to you people, of course. You can't get rid of me that easily.

Last week Thursday, I packed up 10 months of my life into one suitcase, a backpack, and purse-zilla and hopped on a plane to go home. When I was at the Marconi airport waiting to board, I wrote a goodbye post that I promptly trashed for being too emotional.

I'm not a sentimental type, at least not in public, but when I had to hug Dru goodbye at 5 AM in front of Via Rialto, 23 (AKA my self-adopted home away from home), I got a little teary. After checking my back at Marconi and getting through security, I began having tunnel vision and ohmygodohmygodwhatamidoingwhereamigoinglifeisscary moments. It didn't help that I was still feeling slightly hungover from the celebrations from the night before (Read: Dru and I watching Easy A drinking limoncello and wine like the crazy, girls gone wild that we are aren't) and had guzzled down 3 cups of espresso before leaving. Now, I'm not a math major, but to me that equation reads:

 No sleep + slight hangover + emotional goodbyes + freakouts about future + gross airport air + too much a lot of espresso = Hot Mess Lindsay

Saying goodbye is a strange thing, especially when you don't feel like you're leaving. When you say goodbye to the people, places, and things that you've become so used to, it never feels quite real. But you know it's real. Talk about cognitive dissonance.

All jokes aside, I'm very sad to leave Italy, to finish the final pages of this remarkable chapter in my unwritten, phantom autobiography. This has been the most epic, terrifying, fulfilling, difficult, beautiful year of my life. I have done things I never imagined I'd do, traveled to places I've only dreamed of, grown more than I'd ever thought possible, and--above all--met the most incredible, caring, beautiful people. Over the course of the year, I've realized that it's not the places you go or the souvenirs that you buy that make travel or study abroad so significant--it's the people you meet along the way. Travel isn't as fun if you don't have a partner in crime. Studying is only worth your time in someone is there to distract you (okay, maybe not... but it makes it so much more fun). I suppose this blog post is really a (platonic) love letter to the people that made my year so utterly fantastic. And it was so, so hard to say goodbye to them.

Saying goodbye is hard--but so are all the things that make life worthwhile, which means Goodbye must be a pretty worthwhile thing. Endings are sad--they mean saying goodbye--but you can only start a new chapter once you sign off on the one you're writing living. At the heart of all things, isn't that what life is about? Beginnings and Ends? Really, isn't life just what happens between Birth and Death (the two biggest Beginnings and Ends), which act like bookends on an otherwise extensive library of adventures and misadventures (is there really a difference between the two?). We write the story of our life. We make the decisions that make our story progress. We are the ones who decide whether to be the protagonist, the hero/heroine, the victim, the villain, the best friend,... of our own life story. 

This year was one of the best chapters to date... but I tend to think that every year is the best chapter thus far. And I hope, I pray, I beg that things continue as such. That doesn't mean that things always need to go write, that all events need to be happy, that you can't write in a few tears or scars... You need to have lows in order to have highs. In the end, all that really matters is that your highs make the lows worth it. 

And this year was so, so worth it. 

*Stay tuned for more, much overdue blogs regarding my year abroad. Just because you say goodbye doesn't mean you can't reminisce. :)

Never be afraid to say goodbye,

L

Memories

Recreating the Last Supper of Leonardo DaVinci, featuring Bo as Jesus.

New Year's Eve 2011 (2012?)

BCSP Christmas Party 2011

Redneck Party! 

Day in the hills

Tuscany Trip 2012

Feeling Sentimental

The inevitable but unimaginable has happened: people have started going home. I'm feeling overly sentimental about it, so (naturally), I am going to make a picture blog about it!

In Venice with Kyle and Sarah

Erin, Jess, and Me. No wine was involved in the making of this picture... kidding.

Miranda!!!

The very beautiful Madeline and Dru.

Lennnnnyyyy!!!!

Typical Sam.

St. Patricks with the airplane-sized whiskey somewhat picked up from somewhere.

She'll kill me for putting this up.

Bang. Bang. Featuring Dru and Cotton.

The "Before" picture. There was no "After," as most of us lost our cameras... or thought we lost our cameras.

THE MAN PURSE!

REACTION TO THE MAN PURSE

This picture brings me so much joy... no ifs, ands, or butts.

Rocco and Brando continue to make my life interesting. Beneath the insanity, they are sweethearts.

Ricci got us lost in a garden. How many Italians does it take to decide to jump a fence?

Sam and Michelle in Sirmione by Lake Garda.

Versailles with Madeline and Kyle

Dranks-giving.

Emma! My English friend!

Paradise Found

A few weeks back, a handful of friends and I made the trek into the hills for a fantastic day of drinking wine, eating cookies, and lounging in paradise. Pictures do not do it justice, but I thought I'd show you some anyway. You can see the church of San Luca in the back of the last two!

Front to back: Emma, Mary, Dru, Me

I feel like this picture describes our friendship so well. 

Huzzah!

"Under the Tuscan Sun"

I swear that if I hear another person say something about “being under the Tuscan sun” in Tuscany, I will throw a salt shaker at him/her (probably her, because guys tend not to get chick-flick/chick-lit references, but I’m an equal opportunity cynicist).

Yes, we were in Tuscany. Yes, it was sunny. This does not mean that you are allowed to make references to a Diane Lane movie (or, if we’re being correct, a travel memoir by Frances Mays) every five seconds. I mean, seriously. If it weren’t for my mastery of self-discipline, I would have totally thrown a salt shaker at someone.

We left for our Tuscan trip at 7 AM, which meant half the people on the bus were hungover. I may or may not be included in this half—I’ll leave you guessing on that one. Over the course of a 2-hour bus drive, we drove down stretches of bland, straight highway until we hit the Tuscan Hills. We stopped briefly at a small medieval town named Monteriggioni. We walked around the top of the wall, and then all went to get coffee and pastries at one of the town’s two cafes. Then it was back on the bus.

Siena!

Our next stop was Siena, a beautiful town that is about 30 minutes from Florence. I’ve been before, but it was nice to go back. The town is beautiful. We were given two hours to go get lunch (highly mediocre but reasonably priced lasagna) before taking an hour-long guided walking tour of the city. We saw the main piazza, learned a little Sienese history, and toured the cathedral. The cathedral. The church exterior looks like the hybrid of a wedding cake, a bad bridesmaid’s dress, and a palace. The interior looks like a zebra, jewelry store, and a church had a very unsuccessful (but beautiful) threesome. Excuse my slightly inappropriate comments. If you saw this church in person, you would totally agree with me

Exterior of the Cathedral

Once we’d seen Siena, we took an hour bus ride to an ex-convent in the hills of Tuscany: AKA our night’s accommodations. This place was amazing. For one, it was in the middle of nowhere. No-where. Second of all, it was like spending the night in a medieval castle—complete with lack of proper electricity and rock-solid beds. Jokes aside, it was beautiful—quaint, for sure, but really nice.

View from the side of Sant'Anna

Courtyard of Sant'Anna, the ex-convent

Jess and me in front of the countryside

The nicest part was dinner, which was amazing. They squeezed all 40-some of us in a room with two long tables and served us food until we felt like we would burst. There was also wine, which Director Ricci has been rationing to us ever since the disastrously drunken events at the BCSP Christmas party of 2011 (BCSP and its students must maintain a professional image… blah blah blah). Thankfully, a little sweet talking from Nick Panzarella got us three or four more carafes of wine. Winning!

Miss Miranda and I looking quite happy with our new carafe of wine.

After squeezing in this really weird desert, we all grabbed the contraband wine bottles we’d snuck in with our backpacks and headed outside, where we spent the night talking and playing card games and drinking wine. I rolled into bed around 2; breakfast would be served at 8. Needless to say, I passed out properly for all 6 hours.

After a standard Italian breakfast (that included instant coffee… disgusting!), we all took our seats on the bus and drove away (quite reluctantly) from the convent. Our destination: Pienza, a small town build during the Renaissance that takes in 90% of its income from tourists. It was small, quaint, and there were lots of flowers. I bought an overpriced scarf, as per the usual.

The garden outside the church in Pienza. 

Sir Gatto from Pienza. This cat was not particularly fond of us, but he was purrdy (see what i did there?).

After Pienza we drove to another picturesque Tuscan town, Montalcino, before going to a winery in the hills, where we took a tour of the vineyard and the winery before enjoying a picnic-like lunch and two glasses of the wine the family makes. It was great. Then we set out on a “hike” through the hills. I use quotation marks because it was more like a nature walk with a few steep slopes down a gravel road. Beautiful, slightly tiring, but nothing like I was expecting it to be. That took about two hours, and we were back on the bus, heading back to our lovely Bologna. 

The main clock tower in Montalcino

"The Garden of Fairy Tales"

I was SO EXCITED for the hike.

Just some views from our hike. No big deal.

And because I just can't resist:

Dru and Katie were indecently dressed for the church in Siena. So the head nun (or whoever) made them dress even more indecently by wrapping them in cheap gauze that felt like insulation materials.