My London Semester Journal II: Monday, March 11, 1996

Monday, 3-11-96
8:40 AM En Route to London
2:40 AM E-Town

After a very bearable ferry ride & now a painless coach ride (through most of which I slept…) — we are w/in miles of London. Whatta trip!

Picking up where I left off… We arrived in Dublin, Ireland’s capital city, at about 8 AM Saturday morning. We decided to find a cafe where we could have breakfast, regroup, and plan our sightseeing for that day.

We walked about Dublin from the coach station for a while and found ourselves in the southern part of town. This part of town holding most of the big tourist attractions in Dublin.

We looked for a cafe that seemed appealing & was open that early… We wandered into a cafe called “Bewley’s!” The atmosphere was great! There were may Irish people & cute families eating breakfast, reading newspapers, & chatting away… A super first impression of Dublin! I ordered a blueberry muffin, a chocolate donut, & hot chocolate — all yummy! ☺︎

Little did Lori & I know when we first entered the cafe, but “Bewley’s” cafe & it’s tea & coffee products are rather famous! And when we opened my Frommer’s guide book & read about what all Dublin had to offer, “Bewley’s” was mentioned & even starred ✪ as one of his favorite eating establishments in Dublin! We could not have planned our early morning meal & introduction to Dublin, & Ireland for that matter, better if we tried!

After breakfast we chose to visit the Trinity College Campus! The quad-like campus with beautiful architecture & quaint old buildings is famous for owning & displaying one of the few (possibly the only) remaining copies of “The Book of Kells.” “The Book of Kells” is an awesomely illustrated set of the 4 Gospels — Lori & I went to the exhibition at Trinity’s “Old Library” and were both very impressed!

Oh, back at “Bewley’s” I bought a cute coffee tin for Mom & Dad as a souvenir of Ireland, which I think they will enjoy… After taking our time looking over & taking in the “Book of Kells” exhibit we moved on to lunch…

We found our chosen lunch destination in an eclectic & upbeat part of town — near by Trinity’s campus. We ate at the much hyped up “Bad Ass Cafe” where singer Sinead O’Conner once worked as a waitress! The atmosphere here was fun too & the people watching factor — both inside the restaurant & passers by on the street — was high! ☺︎

Lori & I both ordered very tasty pizzas & cokes, which also came w/ coleslaw & a scone! I didn’t eat the coleslaw, but the scone was good. Before leaving the hip eatery, for our afternoon tourist attractions, I bought a “Bad Ass Cafe” t-shirt (only £ 7.50) & Lori bought a bunch of silly “Bad Ass” postcards!

Next up was a mission to find the statue of Molly Malone, who is said to have “rolled a wheelbarrow, thru streets straight & narrow… in Dublin’s fair city!” This I knew from an old Irish ballad Daddy used to sing me to sleep with when I was a kid, among other Irish tunes!

So we got a quick look at the statue, a picture in front of it, & headed for Christ Church Cathedral! All day long when we were asking for directions about the city, Dubliners were very kind & helpful!

On the way to Christ Church we stopped in a souvenir shop & lingered quite awhile… Lori & I lingered & took our time to enjoy things a lot this weekend, which was nice & relaxing.

Well, almost back to the Victoria tube/coach stations & I have to regroup for it is quarter past 9 AM & I must be to Int’l Business class ASAP & even give a presentation w/ Brie & Lawerence on our chosen company to research “Guinness PLC!” Going to Ireland this weekend sure wasn’t a bad case study for the background of this Irish stout beer & scotch whiskey business! ☺︎

More on our adventures in Ireland to come…

CHEERS! ☺︎

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Note from Present Day Kathy: I am amused and slightly annoyed by my use of exclamation points, quotes, and … in this entry! That said, it’s been 4 months since I last posted a London Semester Journal entry and over 2 months since I started working on this one. It’s interesting to me how I get into zones of focus in my life and for a while I was really into revisiting, reflecting on and sharing these. However, in recent months I haven’t found or prioritized the time to do so. I don’t know how consistently I will continue to do this, though I still find it interesting and intend to keep going, at whatever pace ends up working for me, at any given time.

I recently started watching a show, recommended by a good friend, that was on TV between 2009-12, called Being Erica. It’s currently available via Amazon Prime and I binge watch episodes on my phone, while getting things done around the house, in lieu of listening to an audiobook or podcasts or music, as I typically do. I just started the 4th of 4 seasons. The show has a really interesting take on making peace with regrets we have in our lives/past and it is sooooo good/thought-provoking.

My point in sharing about the show, is that the main character Erica (and some others) spend a good deal of time returning to key moments and events in their past, with the lense and knowledge they have in the future/present day. The show includes time travel, so you do need suspension of disbelief. Though I don’t get to literally travel through time when I revisit the journal entries, from my London Semester Abroad, it feels a little like time traveling for me. It is both cool and bizarre for me to read what I was thinking and feeling at age 21 from my current lense at age 44, with so much more life and experience under my belt.

As for this particular entry, I love that (not her real name) Lori and I just happened upon a cafe that morning, which we might’ve otherwise intentionally chosen to go to, if we’d read up on our options ahead of time. I also got a kick out of what I ordered for breakfast that day, a sweet muffin, donut and hot chocolate! No protein, fruit or other fairly healthy options and so much sugar. Back then I was a lot less health conscious, had a higher tolerance for sugar, and my metabolism likely didn’t care as much what I ate, as it does now.

I recall be super excited to have lunch at the Bad Ass Cafe, which I thought was a hilarious and awesome name for a restaurant. I also still have the t-shirt, which I wore often in those early days and years after my semester abroad.

Getting a picture with Molly Malone is even more meaningful to me now, knowing I have a daughter/baby girl, who left this world too soon in 2008, that we chose to name Molly.

I love getting to remember this day, as, being part Irish and raised to embrace that heritage, I’d always wanted to get to Ireland. I do hope to return and see more of it someday, as we could only pack so much into our weekend there. I appreciated reading that in spite of our trip being short, we did take time to linger and really take things in there.

Finally, I am impressed that I went straight to class in London on Monday morning, after getting off the overnight coach bus from our whirlwind weekend trip to Ireland!

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Reminder: Unless I’ve been given permission to use people’s actual names, in most cases I’ve removed or replaced the names of the real people who were part of my journey/experience there, in effort to protect and respect their identities/privacy in my London Semester Journal entries. I will also not share details that I think and feel are too personal for anyone I interacted with, my loved ones, and me.

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Here’s the back story of My London Semester Journals from 1996, including what prompted me to revisit and decide to share them here in 2018. And here’s a list a list of the entries, which I will update as I share them.