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Ireland-Isle of Man Adventure Segment #3 Dublin
Day #9 - Day #12 - Sunday, May 19 through
Tuesday May 22, 2002
Subjects: Dublin, including
St. Patrick's Cathedral, Trinity College,
Kilmainham Jail, O'Donoghues Pub.
 The Schoolhouse Hotel, just east of Temple Bar, Dublin. |
School House Hotel, Dublin - The hotel is deceptive from the outside. It looks quite small, but there is actually a lower floor that faces the rear of the building. It is an historic building and there was fighting during the Easter Rising of 1916 in the building. The rooms are all named after famous Irish authors, and we got the James Joyce room and his portrait was hanging on the wall. The restaurant is a lovely, high-ceilinged room. Again, as with Galway and Cork, the hotel was a tad outside the city center, but it is lovely and beyond the noise of downtown Dublin.
Our day's tour began slowly as it was Sunday morning and many of the sites don't open until noon.
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Interior
of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin. This cathedral belongs to
the Church of Ireland (Protestant), something of a surprise to
all of us who acquaint St. Pat's with Roman Catholicism in the
United States.St.
Patrick's Cathedral - Lots of tour busses parked on
the side street,
there to beat the services at 11:30. The church has changed somewhat
-- not quite as tattered and funky - there was a group of choirboys
rehearsing and we watched for a time with the organ making the floor
almost shake. Lovely sounds sailing high into the ceiling. Wandered
around again to see the stone tablets dedicated to the guys who died
all over the world defending the crown. Jonathan Swift's skull - actually
a cast of it - was moved down closer to the door.
Trinity
College and the Book of Kells - We hit the college just
before noon - it opens at noon on Sundays - and there was a very long
line of tour groups. It began to rain, so we stood there in the rain
- took about 20 minutes to work our way up and into the college. The
Book of Kells dominates the first part of the tour - huge illuminated
panels describing the illuminated manuscript process. Interesting stuff,
though I went through it pretty quickly - there was some whirling motifs
that reminded me of Qin dynasty bronze work -- the tao tieh symbols
on the backs of those mirrors.
Connection?
 The group waits in the rain for Trinity College to open. |
Then, through another set of doors, upstairs, and into the Long Room - another high-ceilinged room, this one enormous. On each side were alcoves with ladders, and on either side of the alcove were shelves filled with books, arranged by size - smallest on the top shelves with largest on the bottom. No Library of Congress system here, and proximity browsing would not do any good - since they're arranged by size not subject. Very lovely tour. Great bookstore.
Michael
sacrificed an afternoon with his family to take us to yet another
stop.
Kilmainham (pronounced "kill-mun-um") Jail - Got there around 2:30. It was a remarkable visit.
 Interior of Kilmainham Jail, Dublin. This is the most powerful of all the historical sites in Dublin. |
The
guide explained the place, briefly, gave its overall history, and then
moved us quickly into the inner courtyard where there were two floors
of cells dominated by metal catwalks that seemed also to act as structural
supports. Showed us some famous cells - DeValera, for example - some
of them have famous folks names over the doors. Very forbidding here,
but nothing compared to what we would see down below in the older part
of the prison. Had political prisoners as well as criminals. The airier
part was the relatively newer Victorian East Wing constructed in 1861.
Then they took us to the prison chapel, where we sat down and watched
a movie. Movie was a great summary of post-1800 Irish history as was
this entire tour. Then, at the end of the movie, they split us up and
we got a woman --she was quite good, stalled for a time to let his group
move on, and then took us into the older sections - including showing
us the cells of folks like the Easter Rising Guys from 1916 and Robert
Emmett and the nice cell of Parnell. We moved around, revisiting Irish
history as seen through the bars of a jail.
But, the most impressive stuff was outside, execution areas, where our
guide described the killing of the Invincibles, and then over to the
wall where there's a plaque to the Easter Rising guys, including a simple,
lone black cross to mark the place where James Connolly, too sick to
stand, was killed while sitting in a chair.
 Cross marking the spot where James Connolly was executed by the British following the failed Easter Rising of 1916. Connolly was wounded and unable to stand, so he was tied to a chair and shot on this spot. |
This is a powerful place, well worth several hours. This particular guide did a wonderful job of summarizing the history - she was particularly emphatic on the tragedy of the Civil War - 1921-1923, and the irony that the war split families. And, there were instances where previous prisoners in this jail were now jailing folks that had been co-prisoners.
Winners do indeed write the histories, and though there's an attempt
at balance here, it is truly about the heroes of the failed 1916 Rising.
Which began as a ragtag group of men who had little public support.
Eventually, over time and due to the repressive - desperate? - measures
brought down by the British - became heroes. They still are. Also a
good sense at this end of the Fenians (Feenians), the Land League and
other organizations that are mirrored in Santa Cruz County and California.
Day #10 - Monday, May 20, 2002 - Dublin
Day looks cloudy through the window. Made a little speech on the bus
this morning before most of the group went off to Guinness - Annie took
them.
Guinness Brewery - By all
accounts, the new visitor's center at the brewery is magnificent. Everybody
raved about it, and on their recommendation I will be putting it in
the Top-5 list. I stayed at the hotel, composed a long newsletter e-mail
and then went down and used the hotel computer. Later I met Annie at
Saint Michans, but she hadn't been able to see the mummies because the
church closes for lunch until 2:00 PM. We then had some chores - photocopying
- which took a bit of time
Michael Collins Barracks
- We were pushing 5:00 because we figured that it would close then,
raced through the tunnel entrance out onto a courtyard, diagonally toward
the entrance where there were some people milling about to find that
it was closed on Mondays. Rule #658 — always check on the brochures
to find out if what you're looking for is open that day. Sigh. So, we
got some brochures from the nice gentleman supervising the door of the
private function, sat down for a moment on the south end of the barracks
square - numbers painted on the wall indicating the number of paces
- 10 paces, etc. - up to 100 paces - the yard is huge, and the severe,
British stonework - three stories - with a cannon facing out of the
alcove on the north end. It is now an Irish National Museum, and from
the looks of the brochure, probably on the B list of things to see in
Dublin. Not an A.
Then, we spent a bit of time trying to get a cab, before we got one
- large, heavy driver, slumped back in his seat - he would turn the
radio up loud during the news and then turn it down during commercials.
The re-counts were still going on - election was Friday - and they were
interviewing one of the candidates in an election that was swinging
on 3 votes - it all sounded familiar - each party had representatives,
the county-level officials were overseeing and everybody was very tired.
Nothing new here-see Florida.
Kitty's Kaboodle - That evening, Linda, Joanne Annie and I walked through the government buildings section, past the Dail building - with the Speaker's house right next to the road. Some limousines, liveried gentlemen, and some nice pubs - not far along we came to O'Donoghues - but, because they don't serve food we had one beer, wrote Chris Matthews a postcard, and then went next door for dinner at Kitty's Kaboodle.
 Kitty's Kaboodle Restaurant, next door to O'Donoghue's, Dublin. |
 O'Donoghue's is famous as a center for traditional Irish music. |
O'Donoghues -Then we went next door, got some beer and pushed our way toward the front of the room to watch/listen to the musicians - lead guy in striped shirt playing the banjo and guitar - to his left a guy playing a red accordion, and then another guy playing a dark brown accordion, and then at the top of the circle directly opposite striped shirt was another banjo player. Then in a far corner was Bernie - he was playing that drum-thing - his head hiding behind it, and you could barely hear him tapping out the rhythms. One guy would start a song, and then they all would pick it up, looping through the intricacies of the melodies - they knew them all, apparently. Now and then striped shirt would play and sing alone - some nice chording - guy pushed in front of me apologized to the two of us immediately behind him about his farting. A "bowel problem" of some kind he said. Then the crowd began to thicken in front of us, I exchanged seats with Annie, and then Linda joined her on that side, and I wedged in beside Joanne against the wall. Obnoxious guy from Florida to our right. Finally, when the press go to be too much, we left.
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There is an etiquette, apparently, and locals are recognized by the publican and can order by raising a finger or two when they walk in. A tin whistle player joined the group later. So, a mix of locals and visitors - with a tour group plunging in from time to time, each lead by a different earnest-looking middle aged woman, everyone smiling self-consciously as they walked in, tried to get their bearings, see where the music was, all the while realizing that everyone was watching them. It's tough to enter a pub later in the evening. And, nobody said anything when somebody got in front of them. Music was nice - a nice peek at the continuity of Irish culture despite all the amazing changes in the country. We walked back to the hotel in the dark evening, passing couples on the street. We have an early departure, leaving Ireland for the Isle of Man in the morning.