Last day in Ireland (28 June)

This was our last day to explore Dublin. This morning I walked with Lori to Kimainham Gaol, a jail that is really important in Irish history. The walk was enjoyable; it was another beautiful day and I’m convinced that the best way to see Ireland is on foot. The walk was deceptively long (at least according to the map) and we got to see some of the nicer, quaint neighborhoods of Dublin.

The jail was really interesting. The Irish people are really proud of their history. I was most interested in learning about how people picked sides: At first all the Irish were united against the English. As soon as they got independence (I think it was in 1921), the Irish divided into two groups and had a big civil war over how to use that independence. Interesting.

Outside of the Museum of Modern Art (I'm being  a squirrel)

We stopped at the Museum of Modern Art and then headed to the Irish National Museum. There we saw the incredible Irish High Crosses exhibit. Throughout Ireland there are certain stone crosses (maybe 60 or 70 of them) from a certain window of time (maybe it was 6^th and 7^th centuries AD?). In the exhibit there were replicas of 5 of these crosses (the molds and replicas were made over 100 years ago). They were incredible. When I turned the corner and saw them, I had what some may call a “wow-moment.” The tallest was 6.5 meters—about 18 feet I think.

At that museum I sat down for a bit and started falling asleep (the past few days have been exhausting!). I woke up when Lori started talking to the security guard, an old man. While she talked, I took notes on his language. I found it quite humorous because he had no idea I was sitting behind him listening and writing stuff down. One interesting vocabulary feature was the use of the word “gobsmacked.” It basically means surprised.

After some other wanderings, we went to the Gaity Theatre where we met up with the whole group for Riverdance. At first we ended up right in the middle of a peaceful protest (pro-Palestinian, anti-Riverdance because they’re going to perform in Israel this year). But the performance itself was absolutely incredible. These are the best riverdancers in the world. Okay, I’ll admit I didn’t really know what Riverdance was before this. If you don’t know, maybe you should youtube it. It involved traditional softshoe, tapdancing with some sort of wooden shoe, singing, and all sorts of traditional music. Everything was done well. It was so beautiful, fun, and exciting! I’m so glad we got the chance to go.

We get up early tomorrow to catch the ferry to Wales. I’m excited to go to the UK!