Organization has begun for this year’s Whiny Expat Bloggers Meet-Up (or NAMBLA WEBMU). To join in on the discussion, go check out the shiny new Expat Bloggers in Germany message board (set up by the lovely and talented Cliff). You’ll have to sign up and be approved by the powers that be, but oh, is it worth it.
I get a lot of email thanks to this blog, most of it asking me to share nuggets of wisdom about travel or life as an expat. I enjoy corresponding with readers, but I find that I often don’t have the time to respond thoroughly to all the inquiries I receive. There are also certain questions that I receive over and over again, so I’m starting to think it would make sense to post the answers here on the blog. Thus, I’m going to start answering questions in posts here, dear-abby-style. Because, you know, I’m so very much like Dear Abby.
If you’d like to submit a question, here are a few guidelines that will help me give you a better answer (and increase your likelihood of hearing from me):
Have a question about European travel, expat life, or anything else that you’d like to ask me? You can submit questions by either 1) posting them in the comments section of this post or 2) emailing me. Either way, let me know what name you’d like me to use for you on the blog. I’ll answer questions in new posts, perhaps once a week or so. Maybe it will be a Friday thing. I reserve the right to edit, re-write, ignore, and/or ridicule all questions. Ask away!
5 comments
Looking to get away from Dublin and explore more of Ireland last weekend, we set our sights on Cashel. The guidebooks seemed to think it wasn’t worth much time, but for our purposes it worked divinely.
The least exciting part of the trip, to me anyway, was Cashel’s big tourist attraction: the Rock of Cashel. OK, it wasn’t that bad, but over the years I’ve come to realize that ruins just don’t excite me that much. Not even when they’re really, really old.
The best part of Cashel was our evening there, which involved several pints of Smithwick’s and a series of cozy peat fires. For such a small town, it offered plenty of inviting little pubs. Our favorite was Dowling’s on Main Street.
The next morning we woke up to a large Irish breakfast (one of the best parts of staying at a B&B;) and then drove south along a road called “The Vee” which took us up into some low mountains with sweeping views.
Then it was onward to Waterford, where we ate lunch while watching the Ireland-Italy rugby match in a pub full of cheering fans. And of course, where we visited the crystal factory.
2 commentsHeadbang8 and TQE, care to join me for some falafel?
The other day we found ourselves in Waterford, Ireland, home of the famous crystal. Naturally we decided to stop in at the factory’s visitor center. We were pleased to find a tour of the galleries leaving right away, led by a charming man who was quite knowledgeable about the pieces on display.
The crystal creations ranged from exquisite to hideous to comical, and we enjoyed the tour even though Waterford Crystal isn’t exactly our style.
It’s a good thing we weren’t interested in buying anything, though, since nothing was on sale that day. Actually, the visitors center wasn’t open for business at all, and our tour guide wasn’t really a tour guide, but a craftsman in the crystal factory – at least he had been until he was fired a couple weeks ago, when he and 480 of his colleagues were sacked as the company ceased production.
Since then, fired union members have been occupying the visitor center in protest. They are worried about not only their future jobs but also their pensions and other benefits owed them by a company in the financial crapper.
The occupation seemed calm and well-organized. At least 20 union members were milling around when we were there, guarding the door, playing cards, talking to visitors, and keeping the cafeteria running for their fellow protesters. The building was decorated with protest signs, many demonstrating a wicked sense of humor.
It was certainly one of the more memorable tours I’ve been on.
6 commentsReporting on the plane crash in upstate New York this morning:
German reporter on N24: These are all one-family houses with large plots of land around them, so the plane crashed into only one house.
American reporter from CNN: This is a small community with houses very close together, so it’s very lucky that only one house was hit.
4 commentsAlternate title: Hanging out in Ireland’s Canada
Eager to explore someplace new, we dug out our British pounds* and drove north into Northern Ireland for the weekend. Less than three hours from Dublin and we were at the north coast of the island, which I suppose would be northern Northern Ireland. They seem to prefer ‘Antrim’.
First stop was the Giant’s Causeway, Northern Ireland’s famous natural wonder. It’s basically a rock formation which consists of thousands of columns, broken off at various heights and resembling the ruins of some sort of man-made tiled staircase. I loved it. It made me marvel at the glorious diversity of our planet’s landscapes… yeah, it was that good. The clear, sunny weather and gorgeous coastal scenery didn’t hurt, either.
Having had our fill of nature, next we visited the Old Bushmills whiskey distillery for a tour. It was pretty standard as far as distillery tours go: here’s vaguely how we make it, this is why ours is the best in the world, happy angels, check out this blend that we sell exclusively here at the distillery so act now! etc etc. I’d tell you how much the tour costs, but I don’t know how to make the pound symbol on my American keyboard, so I’ll just say this: taking into account the ‘free’ glass of whiskey at the end, the tour was reasonably-priced.
After a drive along the coast we pulled into our B&B; in Ballycastle, a town I might have chosen just because of its name. The Glentaisie B&B; is in a quiet neighborhood a short walk away from the downtown. It was a lovely little place and I can thoroughly recommend it. The owners are very friendly and helpful, the decor is charming, and the breakfast is yummy.
We spent the evening in town, dining at the surprisingly sophisticated Central Wine Bar and then downing a couple pints at the pub downstairs while taking in the live music and local culture. Ballycastle has a lot of pubs and nightlife for such a small town. Nice place.
Sunday was snowy, and involved lots of sheep. We spent the morning driving through the Glens of Antrim. Although I still can’t tell you for sure what a glen is, I can assure you they are quite lovely and scenic places, even under a dark sky and giant, angry snowflakes.
We stopped in Belfast for a late lunch before heading back south of the border. Overall it was a fabulous weekend, and we found the Northern Irish (is that what they’re called?) to be just as charming as their neighbors from the Republic. I particularly fell in love with their overuse of the word ‘wee’. Adorable.
* In Northern Ireland they actually use Ulster pounds, which are like British pounds except more… fun. But they’ll gladly take British pounds, and give you your change in their less useful currency. Luckily the coins are all British kind, so we just had to make sure to break all our Ulster bills so that we left holding only currency that we’d actually be able to use again.
Greetings from Dublin, where I’m hanging out for a little while. I’m a bit disappointed to be missing out on the harsher winter back home in Munich, but at least we’ve seen a bit of snow here in the past couple days (although nothing like what London got). The sun has made itself scarce.
So far I’ve been enjoying exploring the city and getting to know it better, and using it as subject matter as I get to know my new camera. My diet has been based around cheddar cheese, soda bread, and Kilkenny (although I did fit in a healthier meal at Juice, one of Dublin’s few vegetarian restaurants).
When the weather has gotten too wet for exploring, I’ve been more than happy to stay home and overdose on trashy English-language television. Why hasn’t the E! True Hollywood Story made it to Germany yet?
9 comments
