Home Coming (Or, Why I almost Got Thrown Out of A Museum)

My mom came to visit me last weekend!

In a sort-of-last-minute decision, she decided to make the hop across the pond to experience Dublin, and, of course, hang out with me, her favorite child ;-) . We had a great weekend together seeing the sites, eating good food, and hanging out, and it was awesome to have her all the way over  from the States!

Her flight got in around 10:20 on Friday morning, and after making her way to Stay Dublin, which is where she was staying and also where my apartment is, and handing over the Goldfish she had brought, I showed her my usual commute to the Academic Center, a half hour walk past the antique quarter and an area full of modern, professional buildings. After she met Stephen, the Program Director, and Lilly, the Operations Manager, and I gave her a tour of the building (with an abundance of stairs to climb). We went down the block to Cafe Sol, the place where I usually grab a take-away lunch once or twice a week, and then headed home via Saint Stephen's Green, where Mum was impressed with the spring flowers in full bloom, and Grafton Street, one of the main shopping streets in Dublin. Mum took a quick power nap, then we had some traditional Irish food at a restaurant on the Quays; bangers and mash with onion gravy for me, fish and chips and Mum.

The next day I wanted to take Mum to one of my favorite places in Dublin, the Temple Bar Food Market, which is on every Saturday. I love the wide variety of craft and food vendors there and I have made it my mission to try something from every food stall before I leave. As I munched my favorite breakfast crepe, Mum sipped some Belgian hot chocolate and picked out a pair of handmade earrings from a jewelry stall, then we grabbed a few blueberry scones and some fresh apple juice and headed to check out Christ Church Cathedral.

After eating our scones and relaxing for a bit, it was time to head to the double-deader hurling and Gaelic football match! My school had bought tickets for everyone who signed up, and luckily for me one of the students could no longer go, so she gave me her ticket for Mum and we headed to Croke Park with some of my friends to enjoy the festivities. We excitedly waved our free Dublin flags, waiting for the first match, hurling, to start, but soon after it began it started to rain.

Then it started to hail.

 We stuck it out for a little while, little white beads pelting us from above, but our seats weren't under cover and Mum decided she wanted to go back to the apartments and get warm so, map in hand, she made her way back. I stayed with a bunch of the other students, shivering and cheering for Dublin. We decided to leave before the Gaelic football game really got going, and I was glad because I was soaked through and not wearing a waterproof coat.

The next day, Sunday, Mum, Hannah, Ian, and I took the DART to the seaside town of Howth for the Dublin Bay Prawn Festival. I'm not really a big fan of prawns, and I don't think Mum is either, but there was a big farmer's market going on anyway, so we browsed around the stalls, bought some cupcakes, and walked by the water in the sun. It was a really pleasant afternoon, even though we couldn't quite figure out why, exactly, it qualified as a prawn festival because there didn't seem to be many seafood-y things around. But we left relaxed anyway and chilled out a bit before dinner.

 Mum, Ian, and I went to The Church, the restaurant Champlain had taken us to on one of our first nights here. We ate in the area where we could see the old stained glass and organ, and some live Irish music was playing. Mum enjoyed more Irish food as she tried Guinness Beef Stew while Ian and I had steaks and potato cakes.

On Monday, Mum's last day, I had class until 1:30, so Mum explored a bit on her own. We met up at the Molly Malone statue at the head of Grafton Street and found the National Art Gallery, only to see that much of it was closed due to renovations. But we wandered the few rooms that were open, admiring the paintings, until we came to a room with a large landscape on one wall over an ornate wooden table with a sign on it that said DO NOT TOUCH.

Unfortunately, I sometimes have the mentality of a small child.
I had to touch it. There was a big glob of paint sticking out from the canvas just begging to feel my fingertip. I made sure no one was looking and gave it a small poke.

Then a security guard came out and said "Ladies, the alarm's just gone off." He pointed at a blinking red light on the ceiling.

My face paled and I stammered something about my bag possibly hitting it. I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible, but I didn't want to look to suspicious. So Mum and I looked at a few more paintings, tooled around the gift shop, and then left. When I told her what I had done, all she could do was laugh. I still think they are going to analyze my fingerprint and come after me.

After a bit of souvenir shopping and a tea and muffin break, we went to the Evensong service at Saint Patrick's Cathedral. Mum wanted to sit in one of those pews where you have to open a little door to get in, but we walked in as it was about to start and we couldn't figure out how to open it, so we just sat in one of the rows of chairs behind the pews. The music choir was beautiful and it was interesting to hear the gospel being read in an Irish accent. I thought um might be getting tired of Irish food, so we went to Ciao Bella Roma for dinner, an Italian restaurant where I got pizza with spicy salami and she got pasta with swordfish.

The next morning it was time for Mum to catch the shuttle back to the airport , so I woke up at the crack of 7 to see her off. I'm so glad she had the opportunity to come visit me in Dublin, and we had a great time! It's so strange to think I'll be going home in just a couple of weeks--it feels like I just started this blog yesterday!
Stay tuned--coming up next: Western Ireland!