Dublin

New year, new me. Hopefully, my posts will be a little more frequent this year and not as rare as seeing the sun in Seattle. However, there was certainly no lack of sunshine on my trip to Italy last year. Yet, after my time in Tuscany, my family and I went to Ireland for a few days before heading back home. What was supposed to be a quick stop before heading home turned into one of my favorite places on the entire planet. Dublin, Ireland was truly very special.

Landing in the airport, I was not expecting much given that this was a small detour essentially on the way home from arguably my favorite place to travel to, Italy. However, I was immediately surprised by just how modern and clean the airport and the surrounding area were. Everything seemed out of a futuristic movie. Large glass walls, sleek white floors, tall ceilings, and much more. My first thought seeing all of this was just “Wow. This is probably the most impressive airport I have seen in a long time”. My second thought was “Ugh this looks a little too much like school”, which I did not want to go back to. The beauty of the postmodern Irish architecture extended beyond the airport. The malls around us, the average store, the restaurants, and more were all sleek and very modern. This is partly because many businesses are moving to or being created in Ireland due to low corporate taxes, spurring the economy forward. Yet, it wasn’t just the man-made beauty that captivated my eyes. The natural beauty of Ireland was also something I was not expecting. The grass, the trees, and the overall greenery were something else. While certainly not as breathtaking as the Tuscan scenery, Ireland felt much more homey (probably because I live in the Evergreen State) and was certainly spectacular in its own right.

Walking around Dublin, it wouldn’t be hard to imagine the kings of old strutting around on their horses among the cobbled streets beneath your very feet with the peasantry crowding up the very same sidewalk where a mother is now attempting to get her baby off of Cocomelon. The cobbled streets, the old architecture, loud Irish music, and all make the place feel timeless, almost out of a movie. Yet, these streets are about as old as the first Top Gun movie. This is because of the years of British colonization destroying the beautiful history and architecture of the place. The Great Irish famine is infamous but there were obvious other factors in British colonization that raised the beautiful city to the ground. Even after colonization ended, a civil war broke out in 1969, preventing Ireland from developing economically and losing some of the historic monuments of its time. However, the city, like the Irish often do, manages to find light in this. One pub said it was founded in the year of our lord 2002, an obvious joke about the rebuilding of the area. Ireland has turned what was once a place of tragedy and colonization into arguably the most bustling place in Europe with lively music, pub atmosphere, cobbled streets, and tourists such as myself filling it all up.

Another one of my favorite places in Ireland is the Malahide castle. While I had seen such castles before, the greenery surrounding it was what truly made this one in particular special. It felt like it was right out of Downton Abbey. Once again, the Irish had done it up very well. There was a train that would take you around the park it was located in, adding some fun excitement for the little ones. The park’s greenery was very well maintained and it truly felt like the perfect combination of man-made and natural beauty complimenting each other. I even managed to see a peacock not far off from the castle! Ya, a real peacock! It was amazing, to say the least. Certainly helped make the wait for my VERY SLOW parents a lot more exciting. 🙂

Lastly, my true favorite place in all of Ireland is Trinity College. Specifically, the tour of the Book of Kells. While I am usually not an art/museum person, I was quite fascinated by the way that such a book was created (go figure I want to be an engineer). For those of you who don’t know, it is one of the most magnificent and extravagant Latin manuscripts ever produced. It contains 4 Gospels of the New Testament in a very intricate and beautiful manner. It is remarkable in its attention to detail for every single page, with even the tiniest image having some sort of biblical meaning. It truly is a work of art and it is incredibly impressive, especially for something made in 800 AD.

Outside of the tour of the book, the college was very impressive as well, with the library seemingly straight out of Harry Potter with the wooden architecture, the historical display cases, and the busts of seemingly every prominent historical scientist ever. I half expected to see a portrait move and talk to me or have a giant man come and yell “You’re a wizard Pranay”. Sadly, none of this happened and I remained a Muggle 😞. However, the very impressive library made up for this fact and it was incredible to see all this knowledge in one room.

While I had certainly not expected Ireland to be one of my favorite places, it ended up being one. There was a bit of everything in the city. Big modern buildings with a massively growing economy simultaneously fit into the cobbled European streets and rivers filled with loud Irish music and bars. Dublin is truly a unique city and one I will never forget and I hope that I can visit it again someday. Maybe I can study abroad there at University College Dublin, even! Either way, I’ll catch you next time on Pranay’s Seattle (or Purdue) Departures! Boiler Up!