Ireland

Me and my friends Johan and Pidor had been flying around Europe when we came to our last stop, which was Dublin in Ireland. I thought it would be England all over again but Ireland was something completely different, it has got so much more character. It started off with us looking for the hotel after arriving to the city center and we were tired after the other trips so when we couldn’t find it, we just got in a cab and figured he would find it for us. He started to drive 5 meters and I told him the street and he got confused and stopped. “But that’s this street”, he said. “The hotel is here”. We laughed and got out of the cab again, but he wouldn’t let us leave without paying the fee for starting the fare which was ridiculous since we hadn’t gone anywhere. 

After checking in at the hotel we went out on the streets and every other building was a pub. It didn’t feel like a “lets-go-mental-because-we’re-drunk”-vibe like it's in Sweden on the weekends. It was more warm and cozy and it seemed most people just went in to have a pint or two and chat and listen to bands jamming away with the traditional Irish music. It’s basically folk music with a happy tone and very dance friendly with lyrics that often are fun drinking stories to sing along to.

The only thing that wasn’t nice was the weather, it rains a lot, but with this atmosphere it doesn't matter that much. We had some good days wandering around in the city and having some Irish beer like Guinness and Kilkenny in the evenings. I bought a beer in a convenience store and opened it outside and while walking around in the city I felt like people was watching me in a weird way when they passed me by. What I didn’t know until someone finally told me was that only drunks drink in the streets of Ireland and that it’s a felony. I thought it was quite funny that every other building is a pub but if you have a beer outside you’re a drunk and a criminal. 

On the last day of the trip I went out on the streets by myself to have some alone time since we had been travelling for a while now. I went into a record store and bought some CDs and stuff like that and I thought to myself that I should come here again, and next time it shouldn’t be so much partying. I enjoyed Dublin and I wished I could see more of it than the bars. When I got back to the hotel after wandering around by myself I was amazed that my friends hadn’t broken the hotel. We were always playing tricks on each other and behaved immature. That was until I sat down in my bed and it sounded like it was broken. My friends started laughing and when I pulled the sheet away I realized the bed was upside down with its wheels up. 

I was so tired and all I wanted was a quite last night but since my friends were up for a night out I thought okay let’s party one last night and make this one count, since it was the grand finale of the trip. And when we got home totally wasted to the hotel that night we felt it was time to live the rock ‘n’ roll star life by trashing the hotel completely. We boiled liquid soap in the kettle that was made for tea, and it boiled out of the kettle and down on the TV which broke down by the hot soap. Pillows were stuffed in the toilet so that you needed to pee through it, potatoes and juice came flying over the room when we had a food fight and I decided to make Johan’s bed a waterbed by putting it in the shower while the water made it soaking wet. You could really tell we got no braincells left after this journey and that we were all really exhausted. And the famous last words were “let’s get another hotel, we have trashed this one!”

The next day we sneaked out of the hotel and went to the airport to fly home and leave the mess behind and I was worried months after this that we would get a huge bill for the destruction, but it never came. 

Some time later I went back to Dublin by myself just like I had visualized myself doing. I was going to spend the Christmas holidays there on my own and go see a concert with The Pogues. They are the best band from Ireland that have roots in the traditional Irish music. My family thought it was weird that I was going to be on my own for Christmas and not with them, but I have always gone my own way. I got my Christmas gifts before I left and here I was in Dublin again, I was not staying at the same hotel though, for obvious reasons. 

I went to the cheapest hostel and it was still expensive since it was the holidays and I wondered how I would survive economically. Also when I’m not around people I know well or being under the influence of alcohol I can be introverted and so this trip was a disaster from the start. I spent most of my time getting panic attacks and tried to calm myself down by finding internet cafés to chat with my Swedish friends to feel like I wasn’t totally alone in the world. Funny how there once was cafés with computers, they didn’t have a long lifespan though, did they? 

I saw Oscar Wilde´s childhood home from outside and went to the nearby statue of him in the park next to the house. 

He’s one of my favourite writers and I had plans to go to the Guinness brewery to try and be active so I wouldn’t think too much. I had never had panic disorder before so it was hard on me. I never went to the brewery because I felt the need to go back to the hostel again to hide from the outside world and while lying there I heard the neighbors fight like they always did. It sounded like a family with kids and they always had loud fights which seemed so depressing since it was almost Christmas eve.

I was a member of a community online called Helgon (Saints in English) which was like a small version of Facebook for alternative people, although I hate that term. I had gotten in contact with a girl from Ireland on the site and I thought I would save myself from my misery by meeting up with her at a bar, so I would have some company. She was up for it and we decided a time and place. I was nervous going there because I’m so shy for people I don’t know, especially at this moment in my life. I couldn’t find her in the bar so I sat down and had a beer, I drank it very slowly and I got nervous every time the door opened behind me. I drank the last sip of the beer and one hour had gone by and she was still nowhere to be seen, she had stood me up. Later she claimed to have been at the bar but I knew she wasn’t and that was the end of our brief virtual friendship.

I couldn’t take it anymore and in the middle of the night I decided to go to the airport to take the first plane home, even though I already had a return ticket for a week later. I didn’t want to talk to the hostel receptionist about my panic disorder so when he asked why I was leaving when I had already paid more nights I said I had got a call and that I needed to go back to Sweden as soon as possible because my dad was sick. It was an easy lie to tell since he often was sick and got rushed to the hospital many times. I gave the receptionist my ticket to the Pogues concert as an early Christmas gift and headed to the airport. They gave me two possibilities at the airport, either I could go with a flight in like two hours and it would be many changes and it would cost a fortune or I could wait until the evening and go a lot cheaper and straight to Copenhagen in Denmark which was close enough from my hometown Helsingborg in Sweden. I had such panic that I almost paid for the expensive one that would leave soon, but then I came to my senses and bought the cheaper one that would be leaving in like 12 hours. First I tried to stay at the airport and be half sleeping on the floor but then I decided I should go back to the hostel since I still had the room. The taxi driver that brought me back into the city thought I had just arrived to Ireland so he was doing his jolly routine about Dublin and all the stuff I should see while I was there, and then he talked about Abba since I was from Sweden and it was just so tragic and comedic at the same time. All I wanted to do was to leave the country because of my panic attacks and here he was trying to sell Dublin to me as if it was my first time here and that I was excited to be here.

When I finally got back home to Sweden I was so relieved, and I made it home to spend Christmas eve with my family. And since they didn’t want me to be the only one without gifts they bought me new ones, even though I had already got mine before the trip. That was touching and that was the love I needed from my family after this horrible trip that I don’t blame Ireland for. Then I drove my family mad by playing on the flute I had bought in Ireland to try and become the new member of The Pogues.

* Best things about Ireland – the traditional Irish music, the Irish beers and the vibe in the pubs and that it’s one of a kind, no other country reminds me of Ireland
* Most mediocre thing about Ireland – you can’t be drunk on the streets, which I find a bit ironic since every other building is a pub, but at the same time I can think of the benefits of it too, so I can’t decide if I like this or not
* Worst things about Ireland – it rains, a lot!

Best countries in the world according to the nerd (will be updated with every post):
1. Andorra
2. Cyprus
3. Greece
4. Denmark
5. Ireland
6. Belgium
7. Estonia
8. Finland
9. France
10. Bulgaria
11. Bosnia And Herzegovina
12. Albania