Hello! I'm back. I'm sorry I left abruptly without writing anything about my whereabouts, or sending a smoke signal, or hiring one of those airplanes that writes things like "Marry me, Jen?" in the sky. (I feel like people named Jen are the type of people who would be proposed to via airplane sky writing.)
I meant to update everyone that I would be traveling in the month of January, but then I was just so excited about it all that I stopped caring about everything else, including this blog. But, look! Here we are. Together again. You, me, this computer, my comfy bed in Moscow... it feels good.
I spent the past few weeks reconnecting with old, dear friends and meeting cool, new ones in Ireland, Spain, Georgia, Hungary, and Scotland. It was quite a time. An eclectic mix of beauty, misery, nauseau, heartbreak, happiness, fear, laughter, fun and embarassment. I'm glad it happened, and I'm also glad it's over. I would say the memories are worth the numerous nervous breakdowns and tears of my summer, during which I saved money for this trip by working as a hostess in a popular waterfront restaurant. (Restaurant work is hard. People are mean. Business shoes really lack proper arch support. My coworkers were cool though.)
It does feel a little lonely in Moscow after being surrounded by friends and/or family 24/7 for the past few weeks. However, everything feels lonely now, as I sit awake in my bed at 3AM, unable to sleep after accidentally succumbing to jetlag at 4PM the previous day.
I don't really know how to sum everything up in one blog post so here are a few scant details delivered in bullet-point fashion:
Dublin and Belfast.
- Northern Ireland is gorgeous. I liked Belfast a lot more than I expected. I want to go to Queens University now. The waiters in all of the restaurants were terribly charming and I always felt kind of sad to leave them after a meal.
- I befriended a really lovely French girl on a day tour to Giant's Causeway. We went to a pub together on a Thursday night and enjoyed a performance by "Rab McCullough and Band". They were quite good. She is writing her thesis for an Irish Studies degree. She also plays drums and loves the blues. An interesting person, she is.
- I had trouble sleeping in the B&B in Belfast, so I looked out the window and watched the people eating in the fish and chips shop (open until 2:30AM!) across the street every night until I was finally tired enough to sleep. My mom made fun of me for this. There's just something really fascinating about people eating fish and chips at 2 in the morning.. I think you would agree if you were there?
- My mom and I drank a lot of good tea and enjoyed many hearty vegetarian meals. Of particular note is the restaurant, Cornucopia, in Dublin. Amazing, wholesome vegetarian food. Butternut squash casserole and lots of good leafy greens. Potentially my favorite meal of the trip.
- We went on a Black Cab tour of Belfast to learn more about "The Troubles", a conflict officially spanning over 30 years, from 1968 to 1998, with most of the violence confined to neighborhoods of Belfast. (It unoffically lasted a lot longer, with noticable lingering effects and unresolved issues today.) It's a complex, emotional, and violent topic that interlinks religious differences with questions of Ireland's identity. You can read more about it here.
------- I find it relevant to note that, when speaking to an Irishman and to someone with familial ties to this period, the emphasis will be placed on its religious aspects - that is the Catholics, who make up the Irish Republican Army, against the Protestants, who make up the Unionists. Although the issues of The Troubles may be rooted in "the constitutional status of Northern Ireland", a local person's narrative of the conflict will almost always place sole emphasis on Catholics against Protestants. In contrast, most news and historical sources describe The Troubles as purely territorial and solely rooted in deep differences of opinion regarding Northern Ireland's position within the United Kingdom. Although this painting of The Troubles is not wrong persay, the difference in narrative between the actual people, who actively fought, suffered, and lost loved ones during this time, versus the interpretation of third party reporters is crucial to understanding the nuances and complexity of this topic.
Madrid.
- I stayed with my friend, Sarah, a recent Dickinson grad who is now teaching English abroad in Madrid. I met Sarah last year and always joked (in a mildly serious way) that she was my celebrity crush. We both got the flu at the same time last November. She delivered gatorade and crackers to me. She's also very funny and strange in an effortlessly cool, offbeat, irresistable way. I look up to her as a role model.
-Sarah's roommate, Katie, is Australian and I enjoyed her company very much. They are a warm, kind, funny pair and made Madrid a lovely place to be. I also met a few of Sarah's other friends, who are also living and teaching English in Madrid. They were all equally wonderful, and painted an inspiring picture of life post-graduation.
- While Sarah was working, I went on a day tour to Avila and Segovia. An older Australian couple, who were also on the tour, adopted me as their own in Segovia. They were hilarious and I learned an awful lot about their lives and their son's recent engagement, without really asking or prompting them in any way whatsoever. I thanked them for a lovely day and they hugged me and said, "That's right, you're a lovely daughter. Study well and be a good girl!", before we parted ways. I may have gotten a little teary-eyed.
- I went by myself to the Reina Sofia to see Picasso's "Guernica". It almost takes up an entire wall, and I stood looking at it for 20 minutes. I have mixed feelings about Picasso as a person, but Guernica is undoubtedly a heartwrenching masterpiece.
- Sarah and I had a zen moment listening to this person play music by the water. There was another guy on the stairs who was drawing curious doodles on some napkins and we scooted closer to him so we could look over his shoulder. It was such a nice time. I don't know why I'm sharing this exactly. It was just one of those moments where you think to yourself, "Hey, this is a nice thing that is happening."
Tbilisi.
- Turkish Airlines is fantastic and my two layovers in Istanbul were quick and easy. They offered free Turkish delight on the plane. I spilled powdered sugar down my shirt. What a dream.
- I was very tired and hungry and nervous upon arriving to Tbilisi, Georgia early in the morning, after two flights through the night. The ladies at Passport Control gave us (Genevieve, Caroline, and I) all free bottles of wine after stamping our passports. I guess that's a thing? A reward for choosing Georgia as our tourist destination? The taxi driver excitedly pointed out that the highway into the city is named after George W. Bush. I smiled weakly and gave a half hearted thumbs-up sign.
- I slept a lot in Tbilisi, for a variety of reasons, ranging from jet lag to drinking a little too much one night. I couldn't refuse the free chacha shots offered by friendly staff in a restaurant one evening, who sat down with us at closing time and poured glass after glass after glass until, some time later, my older, wiser friend, Caroline, was holding my hair back for me in a white-tiled bathroom. It was a low point. There were tears. I recovered, and cannot hear the word "chacha" again without grimacing. No ballroom dance lessons in the future for me.
- We went to the puppet theater the next evening. The tiny and intricate set design, attention to detail, precise movements of the marionettes and the general aura of childish wonder created something that was really very special. The New York Times' review of the puppet theater's Battle of Stalingrad reads, "Striking in its small scale imagery, elegant and delicate in the marionette work of its puppeteers... beautiful, poignant, and lingering." I highly reccommend it.
- We delighted in an organized day tour to Gori, the birthplace of Stalin, and the cave city of Uplistsikhe. Our tour guides, from Envoy Hostel (which I highly reccommend), rocked and, on an unrelated note, were also very handsome. It was honestly one of the best days I've had. We also learned about Saint Nino, who is very important to Georgia's history of Christianity, and Caroline surprised Genevieve and I each with small icons of Nino on our last day together, in commemoration of our "soulful" trip to Georgia.
- I ate a lot of hachapuri, spinach, and eggplant. Probably my three favorite foods.
Budapest. And St. Andrews.
- I met up with one of my best pals and comedic soulmates, Megan, en route to Budapest. We spent three relaxing days walking, wandering, drinking coffee, laughing at eachother, and falling asleep at 10:30PM. It was everything I needed and more.
- We stopped by two museums, one of which was "Hospital on the Rock", which we only decided to visit after passing three different signs, each pointing in a separate direction to the hosptial. We found this both confusing and hilarious, and devoted the rest of our afternoon to following every sign until we eventually ended up in the right place. There were a lot of life-like mannequins inside, which I found a little terrifying.
-We spent a fair amount of time eating different varieties of lentil soup and also avoiding the red-shirted people, who tried to get us onto their tour buses. In a final, half-hearted attempt, one faintly shouted "You're very beautiful!" at us as we scurried past, giggling inappropriately.
- At one cafe, the waiter forgot to bring us spoons for our soup and, not wanting to be a bother, we ate pumpkin soup with our tiny cappucino spoons and looked kind of like those clowns who carry around tiny objects as part of their act. Megan then got stuck in the door as we were leaving and we bumped into each other and nearly fell over, as our waiter watched and laughed. Ahh it's a burden being this charming.
- I followed Megan back to the University of St. Andrews, in Scotland, where she studies now and where we first met on a summer program 4 years ago. I have a couple friends from that program who also study in St. Andrews now. I played monopoly, climbed a roof, made multiple egg and kale scrambles, ate scones, watched 8 episodes of Making A Murderer, and was positively elated to be amongst such good people for a week.
- Upon my mom's request, I visited the tiny town of Dysart, about one hour away from St. Andrews by bus. My mom is tracing our Scottish ancestry back to the Battle of Culloden, and found that my great, great, great, great grandparents were married in Dysart. I scoured churches and graveyards for any sign of McIntosh's (or Mackintosh, or Macintosh) but unfortunately found nothing. I found refuge from the rain in a little store/cafe, owned by a cute old Scottish couple, and enjoyed a warm bowl of soup with bread. It ended up being a nice day.
It was quite a month. I am so thankful for all my new friends - French, Belgian, Australian, Spanish, Georgian, American, Hungarian, English, Irish, and Scottish alike! Thanks for making life feel more fun and the world feel much kinder.
(I love all of my new friends even more than I love this organic, almond milk, gingerbread latte from the wholesome food cafe, Tony and Jen's, in Belfast. And that's saying a LOT.)
Anyways, that's all for my January of Adventure. I'm going to go pet my Moscow cats now and drink tea. These are two things I missed very much while away.