Series of Dreams

During my latest trip, wherein I visited both Dublin and London, I came to the conclusion that this is not real life.  I am living a completely fake life.  It’s a dream.  I wake up every Monday in Spain, but every other weekend I find myself in a new country.  My schoolwork is, well, let’s just say…minimal.  I don’t have a job.  I think euros looks like the money in the board game Monopoly, and have found myself spending them like I own both Park Place and Boardwalk (despite the fact that I’m going to have to mortgage all my properties the second I step foot back in the U.S.).  I’m not just living a blessed existence; I am simply not even living in reality.

While in London, my friends and I had just finished blissfully walking over Millennium Bridge when we turned around to take a picture of the river we had crossed.  I had my camera around my neck, but when I went to take the picture, I realized that there was a woman sitting crumpled under the bridge, weakly holding a Styrofoam cup in her hand, extending it beneath the hands of the crowds of people that were shuffling past her.  She was quietly mumbling something –I could see her mouth moving, but she was not actually saying anything.  I assumed she was asking for money, but it seemed like she did not have the energy to actually form the words.  She was in the frame of my photo.  I realized how easily I could have zoomed in on the bridge – simply and effectively cropping her out of the picture.  How easy it is to look away from things that are easier left unseen.  I have no “solution” to any of this, as this one woman represents much more than a “problem,” but I will remember how she made me feel for a long time, although I will soon forget the sight of that bridge.  I never did take the picture anyway. 

However surreal my trip was, and however struck I am when images like this remind me of the whole picture of the world I am living in, I truly did have a fantastic time in both Dublin and London over my mini fall vacation from school.  I arrived in Dublin on a Thursday night.  I was shocked by how small the city seemed to be.  It was so quaint, but so alive at the same time.  After checking into our hostel, my girlfriends and I headed out to a local Irish Pub for a little night music and some typical Irish food.  We sang along to all the songs that we have been missing from the States (especially the extremely enthusiastic version of “Living on a Prayer” that the ((cuuuute)) Irish performer dedicated to the “American girls”). 

Kelsey and I being all pubby.

Tourist Central.

The next morning, the girls and I hopped on a super-touristy tour bus that took us all around the city and stopped at all the major hot-spots to let us know where we should focus our attention over the next two days.   Once we had circled the city, we could use this tour bus as a means of transportation to get back to the stops that most interested us.  On Friday, we took a tour of the Guinness Factory, where I re-decided that Guinness is absolutely disgusting, but it was fun to see how much pride the Irish have in their beer.  On Saturday, we toured the Kilmainham Gaol (Jail), which is absolutely packed with social and political history.  Our extremely friendly and knowledgeable tour guide threw a lot of information at us, but the history lesson was both interesting and appreciated by all.  Daily life in the jail sounds like it was absolutely miserable, and yet we learned that hundreds of people purposefully committed crimes during the times of the Great Famine in the hopes of being incarcerated, because incarceration guaranteed some meager daily allotment of food. We also learned that only 7% of the Irish population is fluent in Irish Gaelic, due its prohibition during the 19^th century by Great Britain.  Ideas like this also hit us with the harsh blow of reality, as we continued to snap pictures on our tour of Europe.

I know it is.  I can smell it.  Yum.

Kilmainham Gaol - this room has been the set for many films, including the Italian Job.

For me, the most enjoyable part of Dublin was simply walking through St. Stephen’s Park, which is full of lovely little winding trails connected by bridges that lead over ponds filled with swans and ducks.  Apart from the fact that we witnessed one man attempting to feed the feet of his baby child to a swan, this park was one of the most peaceful places I’ve ever been.

St. Stephen's Park.

Another enjoyable stop: Scones at the Queen of Tarts pastry shop.

Dublin was one of the coolest places I have ever been, and it is home to the nicest people in the universe, hands-down.  However, we were off on our next adventure before we knew it.  We landed in London before 8:00 AM on Sunday, and immediately set out to start knocking the most typically touristy stops off our list.  We hit Big Ben, St. James Park, Buckingham Palace, Welington Arch, Hyde Park, Kenningston Palace, and Tower Bridge by nightfall, and made it to West Minister Abbey, the Globe Theatre, Saint Paul’s Church, and Camden Market by midday on Monday.  The very best thing that I saw in London was Jane Kelleher, one of my best friends from high school who greeted me with a huge, teary-eyed hug and left me me in the very best mood for the rest of the day.  I can’t describe how awesome it was to see someone who I have known and loved for years in a completely foreign place.  It was comforting, exciting, and perfect.  Love you, Janie!

JCK and CRA in London.  

Elana, Big Ben and me.

Kelsey, Emily, and Elana re-living their glory days and embracing the fall in Hyde Park.

We walked through this park for almost three hours.

But we were lost for at least 2 of them.

Buckingham Palace.

Our tour of Kenningston Palace will forever be classified in my mind as one of the most bizarre experiences of my life.  I do not know exactly how to describe our tour of that building. We were told at the entrance that it was our mission to “find” the seven “lost” princesses of England within the walls of the palace. Elana, Emily, Kelsey and I were handed (what seemed like) a mystery treasure map with super secret instructions that described the journey we were about to embark upon as a magical voyage through time and space where we were to discover the lost Princesses of England, befriend them, and be whisked off into a magical land where only princesses and fairies live. We walked out of the castle almost crying from both laughter and disappointment at the tourist trap we had just fallen in to.  At this point, the one hour of sleep we had gotten the night before was failing us, and we began screaming over our anger that the princesses of England were not Arielle, Belle, Pocahontas, Cinderella, Jasmine, Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty, and that, in actuality, many of the real princesses apparently did not enjoy their royal lives nor the fact that they were not allowed to have real friends and that their parents paid little attention to them.  Again, our grip on reality is weak here in Europe.

Kennsington Palace: What?

However, our tour of the Globe Theatre did not disappoint.  Having been told that I can be slightly dramatic at times, walking around this theatre was definitely one of the highlights of my trip to London.  And for those of you non-theatre lovers out there, take a second to at least appreciate the impact Shakespeare has had on the English language:

“If you cannot understand my argument, and declare ‘It's Greek to me’, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you claim to be more sinned against than sinning, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you recall your salad days, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you act more in sorrow than in anger, if your wish is father to the thought, if your lost property has vanished into thin air, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you have ever refused to budge an inch or suffered from green-eyed jealousy, if you have played fast and loose, if you have been tongue-tied, a tower of strength, hoodwinked or in a pickle, if you have knitted your brows, made a virtue of necessity, insisted on fair play, slept not one wink, stood on ceremony, danced attendance (on your lord and master), laughed yourself into stitches, had short shrift, cold comfort or too much of a good thing, if you have seen better days or lived in a fool's paradise - why, be that as it may, the more fool you, for it is a foregone conclusion that you are (as good luck would have it) quoting Shakespeare; if you think it is early days and clear out bag and baggage, if you think it is high time and that that is the long and short of it, if you believe that the game is up and that truth will out even if it involves your own flesh and blood, if you lie low till the crack of doom because you suspect foul play, if you have your teeth set on edge (at one fell swoop) without rhyme or reason, then - to give the devil his due - if the truth were known (for surely you have a tongue in your head) you are quoting Shakespeare; even if you bid me good riddance and send me packing, if you wish I were dead as a door-nail, if you think I am an eyesore, a laughing stock, the devil incarnate, a stony-hearted villain, bloody-minded or a blinking idiot, then - by Jove! O Lord! Tut, tut! for goodness' sake! what the dickens! but me no buts - it is all one to me, for you are quoting Shakespeare.”   – Bernard Levin

Sitting outside the Globe Theatre.

Inside the Globe Theatre.

On Monday night, we journeyed back to Bilbao.  I might have been a little sad to end my fall break so quickly had it not been for Thursday’s arrival of the one and only Peaches and Cream, aka Peach, aka Petra, aka mi madre to Spain!!!!!  I can’t tell you how happy I am to have my Mom here with me.  It’s probably the best thing ever. I am going to let her blog about our experiences together next week, so all I will say for now is that it is certainly always an adventure when the two of us are together. 

As a side note, she also brought me 11 bags on Lindt Chocolate, 4 bags of coffee, 100 packets of Splenda, 2 boxes of cereal, 6 boxes of crackers, a jar of cashew butter, an assortment of cashews and pistachios, 2 bags of Craisins, and 20 Luna and Clif Bars.  Have I mentioned that I hate the food here in Bilbao?  I almost cried when she opened her suitcase.  I honestly don’t know how she had any room left in there for clothes, but all I can say is: GRACIAS, about a million times over.  Plus, I left one of my precious bags of chocolates in the common room of my floor to try and make nice with the Spanish girls that I live with, and suddenly, they love me!  Invites to go shopping with them and play on their soccer team abound.  Thanks, Mommy!  I’ve never been very good at making friends on my own.

Number One Care Package in the World - hand-delivered by the World's Number One Mom.

So, while this life that I’m living may seem completely crazy and unreal, I know that I need to take this time to be selfish with this experience and just appreciate each day.  My “real” life will be waiting for me when I get back to the United States, and I am hoping to bring all of these dreamlike experiences with me and somehow integrate everything I have learned from them into my reality.

Other highlights of the past couple weeks include tricking two separate people into thinking that I am a native of Bilbao and knowledgeable enough to be approached with questions.  Low points include not knowing the answer to either of the questions they asked me.  Oh, well.  Stay tuned for the adventures of Mother and Daughter in Europe.  Here’s a preview: Today, while my mother was found sitting in my room when a maintenance staff worker entered to clean it, my mom began frantically making motions as if she were cradling a baby in her arms, pointing to my bed, and screaming, “Bambino, bambino!!!!” Bambino means “little boy”…in Italian.  She was attempting to tell the Spanish-speaking woman that I was her daughter.