I kicked off this summer with a bang...no, not going to ireland, but celebrating my 19th bday on the day my second semester of my first year in college ended. As i returned home, i could only imagine what lay ahead of me, as i prepared for a trip to the land of my ancestors.

Now, the whole reason behind going is, as mentioned a second ago, that my mom's dad's side of the family comes from ireland...ie, my grandad was one of the FOB people....( thats fresh off the boat for those without imagination...or common sense...anyway) In fact, he came to this country at the turn of the century, just a "wee little lad", and went through the 1906 great fire and earthquake that the city of san francisco went through. So, for my mom's 60th birthday, and in recognition of her obtaining her Irish passport, we (my sister, brother and I) decided to take our mom to the homeland. *cue Irish folk music*

The irish coast as we flew into Dublin

So, we showed up in Dublin, checked into an achingly trendy hotel (the morrison hotel if anyone cares) on the edge of the river liffey, and began our irish adventure

First stop...(check out the poster behind them...couldnt have asked for a better setup)

We hopped on a dublin city tour bus, and assumed the role of a tourist (god i fucking hate doing it...)

we drove by this...cant remember where or what it is...

so, the cool part about the bus, is that it gave you a 24hr ticket, meaning you could hop on and off the tour line at anypoint during those 24hrs at one of the 20-some designated historical spots.

First stop, Christ Church...i'm going to spare the description, except that its really fucking old...if you wanna learn more, wikipedia it or something

walkway connecting the church itself to....

this thingy

and here's ze church.

outside

inside watching my family check out some statue (in the crypt...no shots of the main floor)

and close up of outside

and then back inside for an "artsy" shot of my brother...or something....

and now, for something completely different - THE GUINESS STOREHOUSE *yay*. Easily the highlight of the day, as you can tell by the excitement depicted below

so this was pretty fucking cool, albeit rather touristy, but in an efficient manner, it moves thousands of visitors a day through an exposition documenting the history of Arthur Guiness and his beer, rewarding you with a nice pint of it once you finish the tour at the top in the oh-so-not-very-cool-and-really-fucking-hot gravity bar. i DEFINATELY recommend going here to anyone in Dublin...its purdy kewl

beer bottles, past and present

they were pretty stoked on their water too...and i thought it looked kinda cool

anyway, that concluded day one of touring, and we also learned that most museums were closed the next day (monday)...bummer

day 2 found us well rested thanks to our great night's sleep in the achingly trendy hotel, which we checked out of that very morning to move to another place, called #31 (fucked if i know why we stayed in two different hotels in the same city...) we showed up there in what seemed like a seedy back alley, then went through these gates to see this sick townhouse-turned-party-house-turned-hotel... (the party house was back in the 60s, or so we were told...) the guy there was super nice, and convinced us to go check out a place quite significant in Irish history - Kilmainham Gaol - wikipedia, its really an amazing and interesting place, the tour was one of the most informative i've ever been on, answering a lot of questions i had about my irish history.

a cell where one of the leaders of the Easter Rising of 1916 was held before his execution (look up Easter Rising, DO IT)

more of the prison...shitty picture, but gives you a feel for it

another reason the jail was famous was for its revolutionary construction, based on the same design as malls today, where you can see everything from one vantage point, and also in this prison's case, you could see the prisoners, but they never knew if and when they were being watched...here's a pic of the room

the place of execution of the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising

that was the last place we saw in Dublin...more shit later. peace